Tag Archives: Gail White

Gail White, ‘Money Song’

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Money won’t buy you the moon and stars,
but trips abroad and enormous cars
and fancy drinks in exclusive bars,
can all be purchased with money.

Money won’t buy you wisdom and truth
or permanent beauty or lasting youth,
but it makes a very good substituth,
which makes it nice to have money.

The dog and the cat that you adore–
money won’t make them love you more,
but it keeps the wolf away from the door,
which is why I wish I had money.

I’d have a fabulous London flat,
a house in Provence and a Persian cat,
and I’d give up being a Democrat,
if only I had enough money.

When all the sins of excessive wealth
had left me ruined, by speed or stealth,
I’d still have memories of my health,
and the fun I had with my money.

*****

Gail White writes: “I wrote the poem as a sort of updating of Arthur Clough’s ‘Spectator ab Extra‘, which has the refrain line ‘How pleasant it is to have money.’ Some things never change.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine. “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013. Her poems have appeared in the Potcake Chapbooks ‘Tourists and Cannibals’, ‘Rogues and Roses’, ‘Families and Other Fiascoes’, ‘Strip Down’ and ‘Lost Love’. ‘Money Song’ is collected in ‘Asperity Street‘. Her new light verse chapbook, ‘Paper Cuts‘, is now available on Amazon.

Photo: “Crowne-Gold-Silver-Bullion” by digitalmoneyworld is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Nonce form: Gail White, ‘Cardinal Richelieu’s Cats’

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The Cardinal works into the night
To realize his dream:
To keep the nobles in their place,
Make royalty supreme.
He knows it’s time for government
To grow and centralize,
And when the nobles sober up
They won’t believe their eyes.

And at his feet
The indiscreet
Delightful pet he calls Gazette
Provides his inspiration.

He spreads the map of Europe out
And studies its repair,
Especially in ways that might
Reduce the Hapsburg share,
With here a war and there a plot
And now and then a coup..
His opposition? Well, he might
Assassinate a few.

While on his knees
Soft Soumise,
The Cardinal’s best Eminence Grise,
Provides his inspiration.

*****

This poem by Gail White won The Lyric Magazine’s Roberts Memorial Prize for 2022. White, the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, writes: “I’d love to know the names of all 14 of his cats. I’m a believer!”

In a post entitled ‘The Cardinal liked cats – in 1642 he had fourteen!‘, the Eminence Rouge blog states: ‘Here are some of the names of the fourteen favourite felines: Racan (poet and Academician), Gazette (indiscrete), Rubis sur l’Ongle (scratchy), Pyrame & Thysbe (lovers who slept with paws entwined), Serpolet (loved sunning himself), Felimare (tiger-striped), Soumise (submissive, R’s favourite), Lucifer (jet black), Ludovic le Cruel (rat-killer), Ludoviska (rat-catcher’s Polish mistress), Mimi-Paillon (‘straw’ angora), Mounard le Fougueux (‘ardent’, quarellsome,capricious,worldy), Perruque (fell from Racan’s wig), and Gavroche (gastro-angora).’ (Note: this totals 14 if ‘Pyrame & Thysbe’ is the name of one cat that sleeps holding its own paws.)

However in the comments posted by readers of that blog there is scepticism about the story. One writes: ‘Elizabeth Wirth Marwick, The Young Richelieu (Chicago, 1983), says she has been unable to find contemporary documentation on cats, but that he had canaries and warblers, and also 12 small dogs were boarded at Rueil. She wonders if lap-dogs have been turned into cats in the telling. (p. 242, n. 124) But that would be a bizarre change to make.’

A further comment is: ‘I always did think this was true, but now it’s looking more and more likely to me that Richelieu never had cats. I can’t find a source anywhere for all this oft-repeated “information” on the web; people just seem to be copying one another. The earlier comment about the 1938 biographer who was unable to find contemporary documentation is significant. Katharine Macdonogh, in her 1999 book Reigning Cats and Dogs, A History of Pets at Court Since the Renaissance, states on page 124 that the story is a myth, and that it was invented by Paradis de Moncrief, a “toady” at the court of Louis XV.’

Gail White’s books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine. “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013. Her poems have appeared in the Potcake Chapbooks ‘Tourists and Cannibals’, ‘Rogues and Roses’, ‘Families and Other Fiascoes’, ‘Strip Down’ and ‘Lost Love’.
https://www.amazon.com/Catechism-Gail-White/dp/0692696660

Painting: Charles Édouard Delort (1841-1895): La distraction de Richelieu (The cardinal’s leisure), in the public domain.

Gail White, ‘The Solitary Woman’

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In a tiny cottage called the Laurel Tree,
my neighbor lived alone. Nobody came
to see her and she had no family,
so week by week her life was much the same:
she went to church and said the rosary,
took in the mail for neighbors out of town,
adopted cats, watched MSNBC,
and at a roll-topdesk she wrote things down–
things no one ever saw, although we guessed
a novel, memours, poetry, and more–
but we saw nothing, though we did our best.
And when she died alone, at eighty-four,
with no companion but a big gray cat,
we pitied her. We were such fools as that.

*****

Gail White writes: “People often pity someone who lives alone for being lonely. But the Solitary Woman isn’t lonely; she’s complete. I’m always pleased when readers like this one, because I know they got the point.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine. “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013. Her poems have appeared in the Potcake Chapbooks ‘Tourists and Cannibals’, ‘Rogues and Roses’, ‘Families and Other Fiascoes’, ‘Strip Down’ and ‘Lost Love’.
https://www.amazon.com/Asperity-Street-Gail-White/dp/1927409543

“Woman on Empty Solitary Red Chair in Desolate Landscape” by Amaury Laporte is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.

Launch: Potcake Chapbook 11, ‘Lost Love’

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‘Lost Love – poems of what never happened, and of the end of things that did’… how bittersweet; but what a collection of poets, and what a diversity of stories and observations!

Seventeen poets are packed into this chapbook. Seven have appeared before: Marcus Bales, Melissa Balmain, Michael R. Burch, Vera Ignatowitsch, Martin Parker, Gail White and myself. Ten are new to the series, with wicked little pieces from Brooke Clark, Cody Walker and three from Wendy Cope, and with longer poems from N.S. Thompson, James B. Nicola, Mary Meriam, Helena Nelson, David Whippman, Richard Fleming and Vadim Kagan. Bios, photos and links to read more of their work can all be found on the Sampson Low site’s Potcake Poets page, while all the chapbooks in the series, showing which poets are in which, are here. Each of the 11 chapbooks is profusely illustrated (of course) by Alban Low, and can be yours (or sent to an ex) for the price of a coffee.

Heartbreak has never had a happier manifestation!

Potcake Poet’s Choice: Gail White, ‘Feeding the Feral Cats’

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Three at the door tonight –
big ugly orange one,
two gray and white –
staring reproachfully
over the empty dishes:
Where are the loaves and fishes?

And I put out some food,
having no more excuse than that
I might be heaven’s feral cat –
driven by cold despair,
not seeking warmth or bed
or even entrance there –
but sure of being fed.

Gail White writes: “Cats are my totem animal and they have a way of inserting themselves into my poetry. This one was printed in the Alabama Literary Review, and a reader wrote to say she agreed with my eucharistic theology. I didn’t even know I had a eucharistic theology.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine (lightpoetrymagazine.com). “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013. Her poems have appeared in the Potcake Chapbooks ‘Tourists and Cannibals’, ‘Rogues and Roses’, ‘Families and Other Fiascoes’ and ‘Strip Down’.
https://www.amazon.com/Asperity-Street-Gail-White/dp/1927409543

“Many Feral Cats” by Chriss Pagani is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Potcake Poet’s Choice: Gail White, ‘Snails’

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This morning, at my garbage can,
just underneath the lid,
two snails in the embrace of love
connubially hid.

Who knows what dangers they had passed,
how high they had to climb,
in order to achieve at last
this interchange of slime?

I left you unmolested, snails,
beneath your plastic shelf,
because on Friday nights I look
ridiculous myself.

Gail White writes: “This is a favorite light verse of mine, first published in Light. Our sexual nature gives us something in common with even the lowliest life forms, a fact which caused me to spare the snails from eviction.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine (lightpoetrymagazine.com). “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013. Her poems have appeared in the Potcake Chapbooks ‘Tourists and Cannibals’, ‘Rogues and Roses’, ‘Families and Other Fiascoes’ and ‘Strip Down’.
https://www.amazon.com/Asperity-Street-Gail-White/dp/1927409543

“snails mating” by tonrulkens is licensed under Openverse from WordPress.org

Potcake Poet’s Choice: Gail White, ‘Orthodox Christmas Eve’

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What am I doing here with all these Greeks?
Hoping, perhaps, at midnight Christmas Eve,
the unintelligible tongue God speaks
will summon even those who don’t believe
to Mary’s manger. Now the Virgin bears
the Master in the cave. As light through glass
he passes from her body. Joseph dares
believe the story; I can let it pass.
The incense rises like the church’s breath
into a frosty world. This night of birth
swells to a tide that tosses me past death.
But tides recede: I know this moment’s worth.
If love of beauty were the same as faith,
I’d walk in heaven with my feet on earth.

Gail White writes: “I love this poem and always secretly hoped it would become a classic, so I welcome the chance to bring it out again. The to-and-fro of faith and doubt is typical for me, as is the creeping into faith by way of aesthetics. But at this time of year faith wins, and I never let the day pass without listening to the King’s College choir singing ‘Once in Royal David’s City‘.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine (lightpoetrymagazine.com). “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013. Her poems have appeared in the Potcake Chapbooks ‘Tourists and Cannibals’, ‘Rogues and Roses’, ‘Families and Other Fiascoes’ and ‘Strip Down’.
https://www.amazon.com/Asperity-Street-Gail-White/dp/1927409543

Potcake Poet’s Choice: Gail White, ‘Julian of Norwich in Seclusion’

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Because an anchoress could have a cat,
We may assume she had one. That it sat
Beside her while the pilgrims came and went,
Giving, like her, a lesson in content.
That it was quiet when her visions came
And when they passed it slumbered just the same,
But any mice who trespassed in the cell
Were given reason to believe in hell.
That with a feline love of body heat
It nestled in her lap or on her feet.
That it died peacefully, grown old and fat.
Love was my meaning, purred St. Julian’s cat.

Gail White writes: “The Ancrene Wisse or Ancrene Riwle (Rule for Anchoresses), written in Middle English in the 13th century, states that an anchoress might have a cat, although other animals were forbidden. I have therefore taken the liberty of sketching the life of a cat belonging to Julian of Norwich. Her book, A Revelation of Divine Love in Sixteen Showings, ends by asking if the reader wishes to know God’s meaning in her visions, and replies ‘Love was His meaning’. I have transferred this sentiment to her cat.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine. ‘Tourist in India’ won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013.

Her poems appear in several of the Potcake Chapbooks:
Tourists and Cannibals
Rogues and Roses
Families and Other Fiascoes
“Strip down,” she ordered
… all available at https://sampsonlow.co/potcake-chapbooks/ for the price of a coffee.

Potcake Poet’s Choice: Gail White, “Anecdotal Evidence”

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Gail White

Gail White

ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE

My aunt who brought her kidney function back
By eating grapefruit seeds for fifty days
Makes no impression on our local quack.
It’s anecdotal evidence, he says.
There are no reproducible results.
Another person might eat grapefruit seeds
For fifty days and cease to have a pulse.
Cause and effect’s the evidence he needs.
The evidence is all in favor of
The proposition that the dead are dead,
Despite our bitter hope and wistful love.
Yet when my mother died, my father said
That just before the chill that would not thaw,
Her face lit up with joy at what she saw.

Gail White writes: “One poem out of a lifetime’s work is hard to choose, but I find that when I think back over many years of sonnets, my mind keeps settling on this one (first published in Measure). The opening is light (and fictional), but the final sentence on my mother’s death is serious (and true). Perhaps for that reason it has stayed near my heart.”

Gail White is the resident poet and cat lady of Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Her poems appear in several of the Potcake Chapbooks, available from Sampson Low Publishers; her books ASPERITY STREET and CATECHISM are available on Amazon. She is a contributing editor to Light Poetry Magazine. “Tourist in India” won the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award for 2013.