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.

After the death of my mother, 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.

My wife and I are simplifying our days. The server, the monitoring, and the residual obligations that come with keeping a site alive no longer fit the quieter life we want.

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.

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

John Bunyan John Bunyan

Poet B

Isaac Watts Isaac Watts
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.

Strongly related
Their work already rhymes in the catalogue. The rest of this page is the story around that rhyme.
Biography 66% Blended 66%
Swap sides Another related pair
John Bunyan

John Bunyan

November 1628 – 31 August 1688 (~60)
1 live poem · English

John Bunyan, baptized on 30 November 1628 and dead on 31 August 1688, rose from the working life of rural Bedfordshire to become one of the most influential English religious writers of all time. Though he is best known as the author of The Pilgrim’s Progress, a book whose characters and phrases entered the language of generations of readers, Bunyan was also a preacher, controversialist, autobiographer, pastor, poet,…

“The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, and they that lack the beginning have neither the middle nor the end.”

Neighbourhood: Cavalier Poets, Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Renaissance Poets, Restoration Poets
Emotional landscape: Spirituality, Peace, Joy
Isaac Watts

Isaac Watts

17 July 1674 – 25 November 1748 (~74)
2 live poems · English

Isaac Watts was born in Southampton, England, on 17 July 1674, into a household where religious conviction was inseparable from risk. He died on 25 November 1748, having become one of the most widely read and sung English writers of his age. To later generations he would be called the “father of English hymnody,” a title that is not merely honorary. Before Watts, English Protestant congregations, especially among the…

“Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind, which are delivered down from generation to generation.”

Neighbourhood: Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Spirituality, Sorrow, Despair

In time

John Bunyan
Isaac Watts
1628 1748
They overlapped for 15 years (1674–1688). When Isaac Watts was born, John Bunyan was about 46. Isaac Watts was about 14 when John Bunyan died.

On the map

About 148 km separate Elstow, Bedfordshire, England from Southampton, England. Shared ground: United Kingdom.

Themes they return to

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

Shared

From the biographies

religious christian

John Bunyan: bedfordshire, elstow, the pilgrim’s progress, grace abounding to the chief of sinners, english civil war, john gifford, tinker, baptism by immersion. Isaac Watts: southampton, father of english hymnody, hymns and spiritual songs, when i survey the wondrous cross, nonconformist minister, isaac chauncey, thomas rowe, john hughes.

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.

He that is down needs fear no fall
John Bunyan
78% spiritual, self, divine
Compare
The Child's Complaint
Isaac Watts
He that is down needs fear no fall
John Bunyan
74% spiritual, divine, power
Compare
The Day of Judgement
Isaac Watts

The world around them

While their lives overlapped

Notable events from the years they were both alive.

Emotional landscapes

John Bunyan: Spirituality, Peace, Joy. Isaac Watts: Spirituality, Sorrow, Despair.

Skip to main content