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 S

Sídhe

Mythology
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

The Sídhe are supernatural beings or fairy folk who dwell in mounds and otherworldly realms.

Detailed Definition
Often portrayed as remnants of the Tuatha Dé Danann, they are powerful, beautiful, and sometimes dangerous. In poetry, the Sídhe represent mystery, enchantment, and the thin veil between worlds. Their presence evokes awe and the allure of the unseen.
Example
Example in poetry:
The Sídhe appear as the fairy folk, often identified with the Tuatha Dé Danann living in hollow hills; Poets invoke the sídhe when exploring the Otherworld that exists alongside mortal Ireland; The fairy mounds create imagery for poems about hidden realms and parallel realities; Yeats filled his poetry with sídhe as representatives of imagination and spiritual truth; In contemporary verse, the sídhe represent what modernity has lost or denied; Modern poets use them to explore belief, enchantment, and the supernatural persistence beneath rational surfaces
Additional Notes
The Sídhe (aos sí) are not “fairies” in the diminutive sense but powerful, immortal beings descended from the Tuatha Dé Danann; they inhabit mounds (sídhe), lakes, and forests, demanding respect and ritual offerings; poets may use the Sídhe to explore the unseen world, ancestral presence, or the sacredness of place; their duality—benevolent if honored, vengeful if slighted—reflects a worldview of reciprocal relationship; modern Irish poetry (e.g., Heaney’s “The Other Side”) uses the Sídhe to meditate on history, land, and the uncanny.
Also Known As
Aos Sí Daoine Sídhe Shee Fair Folk People of the Mounds Siabhra
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