Now What Do I Do?

I'm 73 with limited energy.
The fierce struggle to get the floors
done is over. The party was a
success. We gathered and talked
of aging, dying, the hoped-for adventures,
and love, and the coming births.

I sat resting after gathering the
borrowed furniture and coolers and
looked at the floor as a work of art,
and realized I don't have to do anything.
Now what do I do? This is like the
morning after opening night where

the Herculean effort has left me
a little dazed. The relief is not yet
realized. Rather there is the feeling
of vacancy as if the killing of war has
stopped and the remaining lives
must be reinvented.

As I balance atop those years
no longer resilient, less practiced
in sustaining after a tenacious effort,
I remember Nelson Rockefeller's death and
begin a slow smile. It really doesn't matter
that the next moment is unplanned.