Bio
Gary Bills was born at Wordsley, near Stourbridge, UK. He took his first degree at Durham University, where he studied English, and he has subsequently worked as a journalist. He is fiction editor for Poetry on the Lake. Gary gained his MA in Creative Writing at Birmingham City University, with a distinction. He has been nominated three times for a Pushcart Prize, including for his post-modernist epic poem, "Bredbeddle's Well". Gary's poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including The Guardian, Magma, HQ, Outposts, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Pomegranate and New Lyre, and he has had three full collections published, namely - "The Echo and the Breath" (Peterloo Poets, 2001); "The Ridiculous Nests of the Heart" (bluechrome, 2003); and "Laws for Honey" (erbacce 2020). In 2005, he edited "The Review of Contemporary Poetry", for bluechrome. His work has been translated in to German, Romanian and Italian. Translations of his work appeared last year in the prestigious Romanian journal, Vatra.
Gary Bills
Sappho's Currency
Sing with shining pennies on your tongue -
eternity has kissed your lips and throat,
for paper was no good to hold a song
and no papyrus fragment yields one note.
Sing Domina, with currencies from Time
if they are noble heads with graceful thought,
and sing of past and future with your rhyme,
by which the morning city's sold and bought.
Sing with mites and sovereigns on your tongue,
with ringing phrases, once the clamour's done;
though ink on parchment cannot last for long,
your songs are golden pennies from the sun.