If the great building has design
I don't see it,
except in a stonemason's conviction
as he works behind tarpaulin
shaping an early saint's nose.
Other stones bulge with unborn forms;
our abbot's hand projects from a crude block.
Christ and the virgin are faceless.
When his carvings are complete
they'll be winched up the west tower
to stare out over the fen
for a thousand years.
Up there, free from iconoclasts,
with the west wind, the flat
infinity of the parish,
they shall surely achieve sainthood.
On the mud flats men first fought,
warriors dyed with woad who fled.
the swamps, leaving no memorial
except the iron they mined
and slave chains
dug from their cemeteries.
The invaders built shore forts
and ditches to celebrate
their subjugation of the land. Ramparts
now chewed by the sea.
Centuries later danes wintered on this coast,
left few relics or place names
to commemorate their coming.
Except a memory of bloodshed.
On these same flats
saints came ashore.
Faith spread slowly; old ways
are long lived in the marshes
where a simple stone cross rises by a
monument to jutish kings.
It's a mariner's landmark now
to the countless men who've
clashed here, built
civilization out of their blood.