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


Compare Poets

Pick two poets who seem to have nothing to do with each other — a Gothic American and a pastoral Englishman, say — and see where the catalogue actually joins them: overlapping years, shared ground, distinctive themes, and the poems that secretly rhyme.

Poet A

Sarah Doudney Sarah Doudney

Poet B

Cecil Frances Alexander Cecil Frances Alexander
Compare two related contemporaries

A random pair who overlapped in time and whose poems already rhyme in the catalogue — a way into poets you may not have met.

Kindred spirits
Their work already rhymes in the catalogue. The rest of this page is the story around that rhyme.
Biography 75% Blended 75%
Swap sides Another related pair
Sarah Doudney

Sarah Doudney

15 January 1841 – 8 December 1926 (~85)
1 live poem · English

Sarah Doudney was born on 15 January 1841 in Portsea, Hampshire, at a time when the crowded naval and commercial communities around Portsmouth were expanding alongside Victorian Britain’s confidence in trade, empire, religion, and print. She was the daughter of a soap and candle manufacturer, and the practical details of that background matter. Although later summaries have sometimes simplified it into a “working-cla…

“If you set out to do a good deed, you may do a hundred small kindnesses on the way.”

Neighbourhood: Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Victorian Poets, Women Poets
Emotional landscape: Sorrow, Despair, Longing
Listen Timeline Affinities
Cecil Frances Alexander

Cecil Frances Alexander

14 April 1818 – 12 October 1895 (~77)
3 live poems · English

Cecil Frances Alexander, born Cecil Frances Humphreys on 14 April 1818 and dead on 12 October 1895, became one of the most widely sung and influential hymn writers of the nineteenth century. Her name may be less immediately familiar than the opening lines of her best-known hymns, yet “Once in Royal David’s City,” “All Things Bright and Beautiful,” “There Is a Green Hill Far Away,” and “Jesus Calls Us o’er the Tumult”…

“I have not attempted to write down to the children, but to write up to them.”

Neighbourhood: Children's Verse, Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Irish Poets
Emotional landscape: Spirituality, Wonder, Joy
Listen Timeline Affinities

In time

Sarah Doudney
Cecil Frances Alexander
1818 1926
They overlapped for 55 years (1841–1895). When Sarah Doudney was born, Cecil Frances Alexander was about 23. Sarah Doudney was about 54 when Cecil Frances Alexander died.
Sarah Doudney in history Cecil Frances Alexander in history Years they were given

On the map

About 453 km separate Portsea, Hampshire, England from Dublin, Ireland. Shared ground: United Kingdom.

Sarah Doudney

Cecil Frances Alexander

Open both on the History Atlas

Themes they return to

Distinctive words drawn from each poet’s critiqued poems — what they keep writing about, not just what their biographies mention.

No overlapping top terms in the poem critiques — any kinship may sit in mood rather than vocabulary.

Sarah Doudney only

water lesson life proverb love

Cecil Frances Alexander only

world social nature faith beauty creation land fairy dreams truth ideal reality

From the biographies

religious social

Sarah Doudney: portsea, hampshire, the lesson of the water-mill, the christian's good-night, the sunday magazine, good words, the quiver, victorian literature. Cecil Frances Alexander: anglo-irish protestant, william alexander, once in royal david's city, all things bright and beautiful, there is a green hill far away, jesus calls us o’er the tumult, hymns for little children, verses for holy seasons.

Poems that secretly rhyme

The closest poem-to-poem matches in critique space — the sort of kinship a listener hears before the catalogue admits it.

The Lesson of the Water Mill
Sarah Doudney
74% life
Compare
When Winter's Closing Shadows Fall
Cecil Frances Alexander
The Lesson of the Water Mill
Sarah Doudney
66%
Compare
Dreams
Cecil Frances Alexander
The Lesson of the Water Mill
Sarah Doudney
66%
Compare
All Things Bright and Beautiful
Cecil Frances Alexander

The world around them

While their lives overlapped

Notable events from the years they were both alive.

1842 First Pale Lager Brewed in Pilsen
1845 Great Famine in Ireland (1845)
1845 The Outbreak of the Irish Potato Famine
1845 Thoreau's Walden Experiment Begins
1846 Publication of Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell
1846 Thoreau's Arrest for Civil Disobedience
1847 Publication of Agnes Grey
1848 Publication of The Biglow Papers

Sarah Doudney

1852 First Published Poem by Sarah Doudney
1865 Marriage of Sarah Doudney
1870 Publication of 'The Christian's Good Night'
1886 Publication of 'The Poetical Works of Sarah Doudney'
1890 Friendship with Fellow Poet
1894 Publication of 'The Story of a Life'
1905 Publication of 'The Golden Ladder'
1920 Final Years in Brighton

Cecil Frances Alexander

1835 Early Literary Development of Cecil Frances Alexander
1848 Publication of 'All Things Bright and Beautiful'
1848 Publication of 'Once in Royal David's City'
1850 Marriage to William Alexander
1850 Relocation to Armagh, Ireland
1858 Publication of 'There is a Green Hill Far Away'
1860 Involvement in Charitable Work
1861 Publication of 'The Child's Book of Praise'

Emotional landscapes

Sarah Doudney: Sorrow, Despair, Longing. Cecil Frances Alexander: Spirituality, Wonder, Joy.

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