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

Powers that be

Idiomatic Phrase
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

Those holding authority or power in a given context; refers to individuals or institutions currently exercising control, often implying established hierarchy rather than personal influence.

Detailed Definition
Powers that be means the authorities, rulers, institutions, or unseen forces that control decisions and shape circumstances. In poetry, the idiom can refer to governments, employers, religious hierarchies, literary gatekeepers, fate, or social convention. Its vagueness is useful because power often feels impersonal and remote. A poet may use it satirically, resentfully, or resignedly to show how individuals live under decisions made elsewhere. The phrase invites questions about authority, accountability, and the human face of systems.
Example
Example in poetry:
A protest poem might address the powers that be as faceless figures behind high windows; In comic verse, the powers that be forbid dancing, so the village dances softly; The phrase means those in authority; A poet can use it to make power sound distant and impersonal.
Additional Notes
The powers that be means those who hold authority, often distant, unnamed, or impersonal. The phrase has biblical roots and is useful in poetry about institutions, government, fate, employers, church, or bureaucracy. It can sound resigned, ironic, or resistant. Students should notice how vagueness itself matters: the powerful are not named, yet their influence is felt. The idiom suits poems about ordinary people facing abstract systems of control.
Also Known As
authorities
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