Love is irrelevant.

I've written a dozen poems like this
they make me feel sick, they clench my ribs
searching for the words to match.

I start them same, the kindness in your
hipbones, your heart swelling in my gut,
the swallowing of each other with water
or a cold drink. Not to be chewed.

I continue with the distance, drinking wine
from a plastic bottles and clutching a telephone
on Rue de Foch. You talk to me for while and hang up,
you cycle around Canada for hours,
searching for something that may or may not be me
and I wait by the phone, by the keyboard, clicking my mouse.

Then I tell the story of when we both come back
and you are ugly, and I am embarrassed.
Your face is a cancerous lung and it disgusts me,
you spill yoghurt on my bedsheets and shove
sharp crisps in your mouth,
you offer me one and I am afraid.

Next is the months after, the years after:
my skin looks strange. I'm an alcoholic.
I puke up everything I eat, everything I feel,
everything that reminds me of you
and I still  wait by the phone, by the keyboard,
clicking my mouse and you
you are still ugly.