Perhaps it was too much to discuss one’s own death sentence. Or perhaps we already knew. Because after all, there are times like this, when hurricanes named Dorian — a name forever associated with horror and the undying — ferociously bear down on the places and the people we love, providing a foretaste of what is to come when the waters will not recede.

It is difficult to summon humor now. We are an archipelago of 700 islands linked to a global archipelago of small communities of Bahamians across the world. I now live in what is often referred to as the northern Caribbean city of Miami. The storm assaulted two of the larger more populated islands in the north of the country, just a hundred miles away. I can feel the occasional bands of rain and breeze, while I hear reports of 200-, 185-, 165-mile-per-hour winds. I think, what will be left?

This is no longer unusual for Caribbean people. As I shared video footage with friends in Puerto Rico, they remarked, “I know the sound of that wind.” Is this what it means to be intimately connected by horror? Is there a new creolized language and aesthetic we have now become fluent in by default? We are island people. Where do you go? We live on slim margins.

On Day 2, the footage became less intense. We had watched light poles snap quickly and the grid fail. We had seen the sea break its boundaries, joining the rising canals to reclaim the earth. I had watched as friends documented the strange brown and gray water rising onto their porches, over car roofs and into their houses. We had shared images of families who had done all the recommended preparations become trapped, praying to be rescued.

We had seen inside homes where the detritus bobbed in waters 10 feet high and unreal images of sharks and large fish swimming outside in the deluge, even as the water continued to rise 15 feet, then 20 feet. We had seen roofs blowing off like sheets of paper, cars and boats upended like toys. We had cheered as people swam to safety and cried upon hearing reports of others who had tried to escape and failed. We had seen homes built for five become refuge for 50. We furiously texted friends and family to make sure they were O.K. and we felt helpless.

As landlines failed and batteries died, the footage stopped. Communications were suddenly interrupted. The last text I received was from a friend at 3:45 a.m. on Monday: “This storm is a beast — but we are hanging in there.” There has been no word since.