Gerald Burns was an American poet and artist, author of A Book of Spells (first third) (Quincy IL: Salt Lick Press, 1978), Toward a Phenomenology of Written Art (New Paltz NY: Treacle Press, 1979), Boccherini's Minuet (Quincy IL: Salt Lick Press, 1981), Aesthetics (Dallas: WOWAPI: 1986), A Thing About Language (Carbondale IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1990), Shorter Poems (Normal IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 1993), Longer Poems (Dallas: Barnburner Press, 1994) and other books.

He was born and raised in Michigan, and he went to Harvard and Trinity (Dublin).  He lived, among other places, in Dallas, Thompson CT, Austin, and Portland OR.

The Gerald Burns Society thinks his work ought to be available to a wider public.