The ants scavenging the outdoor table never bite, never wander over my hand. There is nothing to read. Not the back anyway, and my interest in palmistry lasted a week in Saint-Valery-sur-Somme, as a teenager finding books on the subject under the stairs.
Ants are important for soil health, nutrient recycling, seed dispersal and the control of other insects. They may not have the capacity to read, but successfully live in complex social structures and can solve problems.
What is left to read on a page not redacted or crossed? The desire is to make ideas cohere and language to do its duty in a poem. I am not a natural poet, meaning not obsessed by words or by their contradictions, but am deeply suspicious of their vast transcendent ambitions.
