TWILIGHT ZONE

Matt Gaw conjures up the miracle of the celestial light show that plays out from dawn to dusk

Istand on the beach with my back to the sea, listening to the flat, rattling intake of breath as the water sucks away shingle. The sun is two-thirds hidden but still not quite set. It forms a thick, burning wedge still clearly visible above the soft, sandy bluff. It is a halo of light below the blush of the lower sky, a giant, bloodred flower that blossoms on the inside of my eyelids every time I blink.

The sky itself looks as though it is splitting, like an oil stored too long. The heavy sediments of the dark settle, while overhead the colours shift and merge like newly applied watercolours running into one another – reds and pinks, yellows and white. Only in the highest reaches of the atmosphere, where the sun’s rays still shine from beyond the Earth’s curve, does the sky remain a brittle, icy blue. I watch as a plane flies almost directly up, its vapour trail a thread of gold that sews the shades together, jetting from the new darkness to the old light of day. I check my watch and turn around. It’s nearly time.

I’ve always loved coming here to the coast of Covehithe, both for its quiet and for its unerring strangeness. Nestled between the genteel promenades of Southwold to the south and the fallen splendour of Lowestoft to the north, it is a place where the mild flatness of East Anglia slowly unravels into the sea; one of the first places in the country to see the sun and one of the first to lose it. At certain times of the month, the same is true of the moon. It’s why I have come here this evening, to experience our most familiar light at night. A glowing changeling that has directed travellers and bewitched all living things – man and moth alike.

I’ve been wondering if the moon still has that power. In a world of technology and artificial light, most of us no longer need it for navigation. The generationsold understanding of its cycle, how its waxing and waning signifies both the passing of days and the changing of seasons, is being forgotten. The moon is melting into the background, into insignificance.

The sea continues to suck and lick. A tern calls, sharp and bidding. Over the horizon of the North Sea comes the moon. First a glow, then a pale, pinkish cuticle that swells into a weakling light. It continues to rise, an ever-expanding, everbrightening island – until, after only a couple of minutes, it tears away from the membrane of water, dripping light onto the Earth, shining back at the sunken sun. The birth of the full moon. ‘Under the Stars: A Journey into Light’ by Matt Gaw (£12.99, Elliott & Thompson) is published on 20 February.