A quiet notice V2Melody closes at midnight on , Spanish time.

Closes

A note from Richard

V2Melody will close at midnight on 20 January 2028

This site has been a retirement project in musical poetry: poems chosen with care and set to music, offered freely for as long as it felt right to keep the garden open.

The work no longer holds the place it once did in my life. I have gone as far with it as I wish to go. Like a sand mandala, it was made to be completed and then released. I am not attached to its permanence, and I do not believe any of it needs to last beyond the time it was given. The poems were already here before I arrived and began to experiment with them. They will still be here when these musical experiments, and indeed myself, have been swept away, like the sand of a mandala. Nothing has been lost.

I want a simpler end to my life, days of simple love and enjoyment with my wonderful wife of 20 years. The work of maintaining a server, the monitoring, and the residual obligations that come with keeping a site alive no longer fit that life.

From 4 November 2026 I will not be adding new poems or musical poems to the site.

The experimental music I am making now is on my Suno profile. Those pieces stay there, and are not added to this site.

Until midnight on 20 January 2028, Spanish time, everything remains available exactly as it is. That is when my VPS server contract comes to an end, and it will not be renewed. After that, the server will be switched off and the site will disappear.

The Mandala Is Finished explains this more fully.

Thank you to anyone who found a poem, a track, or a quiet moment here.

The pleasure was in the making.

Richard

Home › Glossary › Letter O

Oracle

World Religion
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A person or place through which a deity is believed to speak, providing prophecy or counsel.

Detailed Definition
Oracles, such as the famous Oracle of Delphi in ancient Greece, were conduits for divine wisdom, offering often cryptic guidance. The concept represents the human desire to know the future or the will of the gods. In poetry, the oracle symbolizes hidden knowledge, fate, and the mysterious voice of the unconscious or the divine. Poets may position themselves as oracles, or seek oracular wisdom, using the ambiguity and authority of the oracle to explore themes of truth, destiny, and the difficulty of interpreting signs.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Greek-inspired poetry, Oracle speaks cryptic truth: “Delphi’s mist—Oracle says, ‘Know thyself’”; In biblical verse, God’s word is true Oracle: “Not riddles, but clarity—Oracle of justice and mercy”; In contemporary poetry, Oracle is inner voice: “Dreams whisper—Oracle in the language of symbols”; Poets caution Oracle’s ambiguity: “Oracle speaks in smoke—interpret with humility.”
Additional Notes
Oracles—Delphi in Greece, Urim/Thummim in Israel, Ifá in Yoruba tradition—mediate divine will through ambiguous utterances; their enigmatic nature invites interpretation and humility; poets adopt oracular voice to convey prophetic insight shrouded in metaphor, reminding readers that divine truth often arrives veiled, demanding discernment and courage.
Also Known As
Pythia (Greek) Seer Prophetess The Diviner The Prophetess The Seer tairngreacht
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