This is one of a series of wrestlings with a prompt from my writers' group - "Causeway"

Across the grey plate stands the island,

its claim on life attested by stone,

the twinned towers of battle and worship

set against the grey expanse of sea

and sky. It is the prayer that calls us,

quiet shuffling of feet as the bell

tolls, all reduced to simplicity

beneath a canopy of crying gulls

and piping oyster catchers. The sea

shivers as a gust of wind feathers

across the flat grey waters. We wait

for the road to rise, now a shadow,

now a ripple, now the first sand bar.

In Europe's dark heart, the watch towers

would point to horrors in captured space -

here they declare a long distilling

to the purity of skeleton,

survival and service, bare outline,

elemental, ascetic,naked.

We watch the stones rise from the sea

to form a connection, a lifeline.

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