He keeps telling me I smell,
keeps bringing it up
intimating that no one else is motivated to speak this truth that only he has my interests at heart
or his nose to my grindstone
and that the grindstone is pungent.

I keep suggesting he has some sort of synesthesia
or delusions about his sense of my scent.
I continue to argue
he might have some alternative agenda,
perhaps an investment in a local perfumerie
or a traumatic incident with a pigpen as a child
but it is not my job to heal his wounds.
It is my job to pay his bills
with my frequent sessions
as he tells me
over and over again
that I stink.

It must be very difficult for him.