Without Warning

Elizabeth Bishop leaned on a table, it cracked, both fell to the floor. A gesture gone sadly awry. This was close to fact and quickly became symbolic, bound to occur in Florida, where she was surrounded by rotting abundance and greedy insects. One moment a laughing smile, a graceful hand alighting on solid furniture, a casual shift of weight, the next, undignified splayed legs. The shell of the table proved to be stuffed with termite eggs. True, it was a fall from no great height— merely the height of herself, and although the hollowed-out table failed, at least the floor held, though probably infested by termites as well, and possibly built on a latent sinkhole, how can you tell? And how could she, smiling and easy, arm moving without forethought and permission, have forgotten fear, apparently let go of a hard-learned lesson? Enter a room as though it is strange. What you recognize may have changed, or may change without warning. Trees fall in hurricanes and on windless mornings, breaching houses where people you knew have vanished or died or stopped loving you.