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 V

Vesta

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

Roman virgin goddess of the hearth, home, and sacred fire, symbolizing domestic unity and spiritual purity in Roman religion.

Detailed Definition
Vesta’s eternal flame, tended by the Vestal Virgins, symbolized Rome’s continuity and domestic sanctity. In Roman poetry, she represents purity, stability, and the heart of both household and state. Virgil venerates her as a guardian of Trojan hearths and Roman destiny. Poets invoke Vesta to evoke themes of loyalty, sacred duty, and the quiet, enduring power of the domestic sphere as the foundation of civilization.
Example
Example in poetry:
Vesta, goddess of the hearth, appears in Virgil’s Aeneid as “Vesta’s eternal flame”; Ovid’s Fasti describes the Vestalia festival honoring her sacred fire; In Horace’s Odes, Vesta “guards the heart of Rome”; Roman poets praise Vestal Virgins as “Vesta’s pure hands”; In domestic verse, Vesta “watches over every household hearth”; Propertius swears by “Vesta’s unbroken flame” in oaths of fidelity.
Additional Notes
Vesta (Greek Hestia) is virgin goddess of the hearth; central to Roman state and home; appears in Virgil, Ovid, and hymns; symbolizes domestic and civic unity, purity, and continuity; useful in poetry about sanctuary, piety, or crisis (extinguished flame = omen); students should note the Vestal Virgins’ 30-year vow and privileges; her fire burned in the Forum; she is “first and last” in sacrifices; her silence in myths underscores her foundational role.
Other Meanings of “Vesta”
Also Known As
Hestia Sacred Hearth Eternal Flame Domestic Sanctity
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