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



Theme Timeline

Pick a theme and see how often it shows up across 50-year cohorts of V2Melody poets. Bars are normalised so small cohorts don't get drowned out by large ones.

Choose a theme

“pain” across the centuries

Bar length = percentage of poems in that cohort whose critique surfaced this theme. Click an era to focus the poem list below.

Sample poems · click an era above to focus

O vis eternitatis
Available versions

O vis eternitatis

by Hildegard of Bingen · Latin

c. 1098 - 17 September 1179 (~81)

No Pleasure Without Some Pain
Available versions

No Pleasure Without Some Pain

by Thomas, Lord Vaux · English

25 April 1509 - c. October 1556 (~47)

Out of Sight, Out of Mind
Available versions

Out of Sight, Out of Mind

by Barnabe Googe · English

11 June 1540 - February 1594 (~54)

Sephestia's Song to Her Child
Available versions

Sephestia's Song to Her Child

by Robert Greene · English

c. 11 July 1558 - 3 September 1592 (~34)

The Triple Foole
Available versions

The Triple Foole

by John Donne · English

1572 - 31 March 1631 (~59)

The Wounded Heart
Available versions

The Wounded Heart

by Robert Herrick · English

24 August 1591 - 15 October 1674 (~83)

The Heart Breaking
Available versions

The Heart Breaking

by Abraham Cowley · English

1618 - 28 July 1667 (~49)

The Noble Spanish Soldier
Available versions

The Noble Spanish Soldier

by Thomas Dekker · English

c. 1572 - 25 August 1641 (~69)

Weep no more
Available versions

Weep no more

by John Fletcher · English

20 December 1579 - 29 August 1625 (~46)

Prepare, prepare
Available versions

Prepare, prepare

by Thomas Shadwell · English

c. 1642 - 19 November 1692 (~50)

Hidden Flame
Available versions

Hidden Flame

by John Dryden · English

9 August 1631 - 12 May 1700 (~69)

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