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.

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 W

Whigmaleerie

Dialect
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 whim, fancy, or fanciful notion; a trifling, whimsical idea or decoration.

Detailed Definition
"Whigmaleerie" is one of the great comic words of Scots, its elaborate length a gentle mockery of the trivial fancies it names. It describes the kind of idle, unnecessary ornamentation or whimsical idea that practical Scots common sense would regard with affectionate exasperation. In poetry it appears as both subject and tone, carrying a playful self-awareness about the fanciful dimension of verse itself. The word's magnificent sound — five syllables tumbling toward insignificance — is itself a whigmaleerie, a delight that justifies itself only by being delightful.
Example
Example in poetry:
"Whigmaleerie" means a whim, fanciful notion, or a trifling ornament; A poet might write: "He chased his whigmaleeries far and wide — / nae dream too daft tae be denied." celebrates imaginative freedom; "Dinnae dismiss the whigmaleerie's call — / frae fancy's seed grow trees for all." defends the value of whimsy; "She hung her whigmaleeries on the wa' — / each one a story worth the draw." gives decorative objects narrative worth; "Life is half whigmaleerie and half sense — / the trick is knowing which is dense." offers philosophical balance; "The poet's trade is whigmaleerie — / the turning of the strange and eerie / intae the true, the felt, the whole." uses the word for self-reflection on creative process
Additional Notes
Whigmaleerie is a delightfully whimsical Scots word meaning a fanciful notion, eccentric idea, or decorative absurdity. It appears in humorous verse, satirical writing, and playful Scots expression, where elaborate diction can itself become part of the joke. The word’s sound contributes significantly to its effect, making it memorable in oral performance. Students should note how comic Scots often relies on lexical exuberance rather than mere meaning. Related ideas include whimsy, caprice, fancy, and eccentricity. In poetry, whigmaleerie can characterise imagination, folly, ornamentation, or delightfully unserious excess.
Also Known As
Whim Fancy Notion Whimsy
Skip to main content