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 P

Poplar

Flora
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 tall, fast-growing tree with trembling leaves, symbolizing communication and lamentation.

Detailed Definition
Poplar’s quivering leaves make it a symbol of anxiety, messages, and the voice of the wind in poetry. In Greek myth, it’s tied to mourning (Hercules wore poplar for Hylas). Poets use it to evoke restlessness, the passage of whispers, and the sound of sorrow.
Example
Example in poetry:
In W.H. Auden’s “In Memory of W.B. Yeats,” poplar trees symbolize communal mourning: “The brooks were frozen, the airports almost deserted, / And snow disfigured the public statues; / The mercury sank in the mouth of the dying day. / What instruments we have agree / The day of his death was a dark cold day… / The crowds of the dead / …followed the hearse… / …stood round the poplars”; Poplars often appear in elegiac poetry for their tall, columnar form evoking sentinels or tears; In Russian poetry, the trembling poplar leaf symbolizes anxiety or sensitivity: “Poplar shivers though no wind blows”; Modern eco-poets use poplar for its fast growth and phytoremediation: “Poplar roots drink the poisoned soil clean”; In pastoral verse, poplar lines roads like green punctuation: “Poplars march the country lane, marking time”; Its association with Hercules (who wore a poplar crown) inspires heroic metaphors in classical revival poetry.
Additional Notes
Poplar trees (Populus spp.), especially the white poplar and Lombardy poplar, are often associated with mourning, communication with the underworld, and restless motion due to their trembling leaves (inspiring the myth of Phaethon’s sisters transformed into poplars); in poetry, their tall, columnar forms and shimmering foliage evoke solitude, transition, or elegiac reflection—Tennyson and Shelley used them to signal impermanence; note that “aspen” is a type of poplar, and the quaking effect stems from flattened petioles, a useful detail for kinetic imagery.
Also Known As
Aspen Cottonwood White Poplar Lombardy Poplar
Skip to main content