In the warm dusk of the moonless summer night,
As on the shingle by the still dark sea
We rest, the chalk-cliffs beetle eerily
Over us, glimmering a ghostly white;
And silence steals upon us as we lie
Watching a far-off intermittent light,
Momently flashing cold and dazzling-bright
Between the dark tide and the moonless sky.

We watch the flashing light that seems to flare
An instant only between centuries
Of ominous grey midnight, and we stare
With eager peering eyes into the gloom,
While over our little lives in shadow loom
Primeval, cold, still, ghostly presences.