Steak and Lobster

Gene Morgan

I sit in the bathtub and stare at the mountain range, and I look at some very large construction cranes. There are cranes against casinos against mountains. I stare at a desert and cranes and casinos and mountains. I google "dinosaurs" and "Nevada" on my cellphone, and a cellphone tower beams me information about two-hundred-million-year-old dinosaurs.

I think about two sea dinosaurs making a sacred bond, in the moonlight, under the sea that was Las Vegas two-hundred-million years ago. I think about eating steak and lobster in the bathtub. I think about all of the money and time I have ever spent, and I think about my cellphone and steak and lobster. I think about my degenerative lung condition and various diseases, and I think "if I order steak and lobster, will they deliver it to me in the bathtub?"

I think "the earth is not weak, and we cannot help it; there is nothing we can do to stop the earth from killing us."

"There are cheap Russian vodkas in the mini bar."

"Fighting the earth is a waste of time."

"Wash you hair."

In my head I tell the ichthyosaurs "there is a mountain that stands next to a casino where you once had sex and made baby dinosaurs, and now your bones are under sand where there are desserts and towers that beam information about your bones to me. There was an ocean full of you, and full of other dinosaur fish doing shit. Now, there is nothing but towers and mountains and humans and your bones that don't mean anything to humans who aren't scientists or ten-year-old boys."

I get out of the bathtub and pull the bathtub drain open. I dry off and put on a robe. I call room service and order steak and lobster. I turn on the television. I rub a towel over my hair. I stare out of the window at large construction cranes that are ominous and boring.