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

Philip Bourke Marston Philip Bourke Marston

Poet B

Philip James Bailey Philip James Bailey
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 69% Blended 69%
Swap sides Another related pair
Philip Bourke Marston

Philip Bourke Marston

13 August 1850 – 13 February 1887 (~37)
22 live poems · English

Philip Bourke Marston was born in London on 13 August 1850 and died there on 13 February 1887, only thirty-six years later. His short life was shaped by an unusually concentrated mixture of literary privilege, physical disability, bereavement, emotional intensity, and artistic determination. During his lifetime he was admired by prominent writers, including Algernon Charles Swinburne, and was known in literary circle…

“The divine simplicity, strength and subtlety, the intense, fragrant, genuine individuality of your poems will make them imperishable.”

Neighbourhood: Death & Mortality, Love Poets, Pre-Raphaelite Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Sorrow, Tenderness
Philip James Bailey

Philip James Bailey

22 April 1816 – 6 September 1902 (~86)
1 live poem · English

Philip James Bailey was born in Nottingham on 22 April 1816 and died there on 6 September 1902, after a long life in which one early work made him, for a time, one of the most discussed poets in the English-speaking world. His name is now chiefly attached to Festus, the immense dramatic poem first published in 1839, but Bailey’s career was more than the history of a single Victorian bestseller. It was the history of…

Neighbourhood: Death & Mortality, Dramatic Poets, Mystical & Spiritual Poets, Romantic Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Peace, Joy, Wonder

In time

Philip Bourke Marston
Philip James Bailey
1816 1902
They overlapped for 38 years (1850–1887). When Philip Bourke Marston was born, Philip James Bailey was about 34. Philip James Bailey was about 71 when Philip Bourke Marston died.

On the map

About 176 km separate London, England from Nottingham, England. Both have ground in London.

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

Philip Bourke Marston only

Philip James Bailey only

From the biographies

Philip Bourke Marston: london, john westland marston, algernon charles swinburne, song-tide and other poems, all in all, blindness, victorian poetry, pre-raphaelite. Philip James Bailey: nottingham, thomas bailey, anne reed, universalist theology, romantic poetry, benjamin carpenter, the angel world, the mystic.

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.

Sad Songs Remembered
Philip Bourke Marston
71%
Compare
The Great Black Crow
Philip James Bailey
To a Day
Philip Bourke Marston
71% life
Compare
The Great Black Crow
Philip James Bailey
Fated!
Philip Bourke Marston
71%
Compare
The Great Black Crow
Philip James Bailey
Stricken
Philip Bourke Marston
68%
Compare
The Great Black Crow
Philip James Bailey
Bereft
Philip Bourke Marston
68%
Compare
The Great Black Crow
Philip James Bailey
Changeless
Philip Bourke Marston
67% life
Compare
The Great Black Crow
Philip James Bailey

The world around them

While their lives overlapped

Notable events from the years they were both alive.

Emotional landscapes

Philip Bourke Marston: Longing, Sorrow, Tenderness. Philip James Bailey: Peace, Joy, Wonder.

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