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

Marianne Moore Marianne Moore

Poet B

Alice Corbin Alice Corbin
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 74% Poems 82% Blended 78%
Swap sides Another related pair
Marianne Moore

Marianne Moore

15 November 1887 – 5 February 1972 (~85)
2 live poems · English

Marianne Craig Moore emerged from the American Modernist movement as one of its most distinctive and enigmatic voices, a poet whose meticulous attention to detail and refusal to conform to conventional poetic forms revolutionized twentieth-century verse. Born on November 15, 1887, in Kirkwood, Missouri, and passing away on February 5, 1972, in New York City, Moore lived through nearly the entire span of modern Americ…

“The deepest feeling always shows itself in silence; not in silence, but restraint.”

Neighbourhood: American Poets, Imagist Poets, Modernist Poets, Women Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Peace, Sorrow
Listen Timeline Affinities
Alice Corbin

Alice Corbin

16 April 1881 – 18 July 1949 (~68)
7 live poems · English

Alice Corbin Henderson, born Alice Corbin on 16 April 1881 in St. Louis, Missouri, and dead on 18 July 1949 in Santa Fe, New Mexico, occupies an important if still insufficiently celebrated place in American literary history. She was a poet of lyrical concentration, an editor whose judgment helped define a revolutionary period in verse, a critic attentive to the relation between art and place, and a cultural organize…

“The poetic symbol is invocative—it is in a sense a prayer, whether consciously or unconsciously used as such.”

Neighbourhood: American Poets, Edwardian Poets, Imagist Poets, Modernist Poets, Women Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Spirituality, Tenderness
Listen Timeline Affinities

In time

Marianne Moore
Alice Corbin
1881 1972
They overlapped for 63 years (1887–1949). When Marianne Moore was born, Alice Corbin was about 6. Marianne Moore was about 62 when Alice Corbin died.
Marianne Moore in history Alice Corbin in history Years they were given

On the map

About 20 km separate Kirkwood, Missouri, USA from St. Louis, Missouri, USA. Both have ground in Missouri.

Marianne Moore

Alice Corbin

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.

Shared

world

Marianne Moore only

cliff fish philosophical beauty endurance resilience snail style principle verbal

Alice Corbin only

love moon nature lover water stone plea sliding henderson chicago self desire

From the biographies

Marianne Moore: kirkwood missouri, new york city, h.d., bryn mawr college, observations, the fish, the pangolin, poetry. Alice Corbin: st. louis, santa fe, william penhallow henderson, poetry magazine, the spinning woman of the desert, red earth: poems of new mexico, imagism, chicago modernism.

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 Fish
Marianne Moore
77% world
Compare
The Failing Moon
Alice Corbin
The Fish
Marianne Moore
76%
Compare
Love Me at Last
Alice Corbin
The Fish
Marianne Moore
74%
Compare
Jehovah
Alice Corbin
The Fish
Marianne Moore
74%
Compare
America
Alice Corbin
The Fish
Marianne Moore
73%
Compare
The Star
Alice Corbin
The Fish
Marianne Moore
72% world
Compare
The Lyre
Alice Corbin

The world around them

While their lives overlapped

Notable events from the years they were both alive.

1891 Conversion to Roman Catholicism
1892 Opening of Ellis Island
1892 Valéry undergoes the Genoa crisis
1893 Co-founding of the Gaelic League
1893 Delivery of 'The Necessity for De-Anglicizing Ireland' Speech
1893 Publication of 'The Hound of Heaven'
1894 Death of Robert Louis Stevenson
1894 Valéry begins his lifelong notebooks

Marianne Moore

1915 First Published Poem
1918 Move to New York City
1924 Publication of 'Observations'
1936 Publication of 'The Pangolin'
1952 Awarded the Pulitzer Prize
1967 Publication of 'The Complete Poems'

Alice Corbin

1889 Relocation to Chicago
1900 Education at the University of Chicago
1912 First Publication in Poetry Magazine
1913 Co-Editor of Poetry Magazine
1917 Marriage to John Corbin
1920 Involvement in the Santa Fe Art Colony
1923 Publication of 'The New Poetry'
1948 Publication of 'The Poet's Companion'

Emotional landscapes

Marianne Moore: Wonder, Peace, Sorrow. Alice Corbin: Wonder, Spirituality, Tenderness.

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