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

James Hogg James Hogg

Poet B

Allan Cunningham Allan Cunningham
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 65% Poems 88% Blended 75%
Swap sides Another related pair
James Hogg

James Hogg

c. 9 December 1770 – 21 November 1835 (~65)
2 live poems · English

The story of James Hogg is one of the most remarkable and unlikely ascents in the history of British literature. Born into the humblest of circumstances in the wilds of the Scottish Borders, he rose from a life of manual labour to stand, albeit often awkwardly, alongside the literary giants of his age. He was a man of profound contradictions: a self-taught genius who could be as coarse as he was inspired, a humble sh…

“Without the shepherd's dog, the whole of the open mountainous land in Scotland would not be worth a sixpence.”

Neighbourhood: Georgian Poets, Nature Poets, Romantic Poets, Scottish Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Fear, Joy
Allan Cunningham

Allan Cunningham

7 December 1784 – 30 October 1842 (~58)
3 live poems · English

Allan Cunningham was born on 7 December 1784 at Blackwood, near Dalswinton in Dumfriesshire, a district of south-west Scotland whose landscape, speech, songs, and historical memories remained central to his imagination throughout his life. He died in London on 30 October 1842, having travelled an unlikely path from the stone-mason’s yard to the centre of Britain’s artistic and literary world. Poet, songwriter, noveli…

“I would not lie like a toad in a stone, or in a place strong enough for another to covet. Oh! no; let me lie where the green grass and the daisies grow, waving under the winds of the blue heaven.”

Neighbourhood: Folk & Ballad Poets, Nature Poets, Scottish Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Joy, Spirituality

In time

James Hogg
Allan Cunningham
1770 1842
They overlapped for 52 years (1784–1835). When Allan Cunningham was born, James Hogg was about 14. Allan Cunningham was about 51 when James Hogg died.

On the map

About 51 km separate Ettrick, Selkirkshire, Scotland from Keir, Dumfriesshire, Scotland. 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

sir walter scott scottish

James Hogg: scottish borders, ettrick shepherd, the private memoirs and confessions of a justified sinner, sir walter scott, the queen's wake, kilmeny, the witch of fife, the mountain bard. Allan Cunningham: blackwood, dumfriesshire, jean walker, robert burns, sir walter scott, william wordsworth, a wet sheet and a flowing sea, the sun rises bright in france.

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.

A Boy's Song
James Hogg
83% world, landscape, rural
Compare
The Mother's Call
Allan Cunningham
A Boy's Song
James Hogg
76% world
Compare
Nature
Allan Cunningham
A Boy's Song
James Hogg
73% world
Compare
A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea
Allan Cunningham
A Witch's Chant
James Hogg
71%
Compare
Nature
Allan Cunningham
A Witch's Chant
James Hogg
70% power
Compare
A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea
Allan Cunningham
A Witch's Chant
James Hogg
69%
Compare
The Mother's Call
Allan Cunningham

The world around them

While their lives overlapped

Notable events from the years they were both alive.

Emotional landscapes

James Hogg: Wonder, Fear, Joy. Allan Cunningham: Wonder, Joy, Spirituality.

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