Manoel de Barros: Ants

I didn’t need to read Saint Paul, Saint Augustine,
Saint Jerome, or Thomas of Aquinas,
Not even Saint Francis of Assisi— 

To arrive at God.
Ants showed him to me.

(I have a doctorate in ants).

Tr. Idra Novey in Birds for a Demolition (2010). Barros, who died in 2014 close to his centenary, lived as a farmer in Mato Grosso and wrote gnomic poems that are both mysterious and approachable - he should be better known to the English-speaking world.