Teo Mungaray: June 2020 Poet of the Month
Photo: Joanna C. Valente
Seven Attempts at Loving Myself
Someday I’ll Love Teo Mungaray
After Ocean Vuong; Roger Reeves; Frank O’Hara
But what if I won’t, forever? That’s it, again, that thought.
I’m afraid most of losing myself in myself. I’ve fought a long time
and I’m tired now. Haven’t I done enough? Why does everyone
want everyone to love themselves? Aren’t some things unlovable?
Not the ugly things, I know women who love tarantulas, and men
who love hairless cats. Not the talentless things or the venomous things,
not all the things which thrive in the underworld of the forest
or the underworld of our desires, but I mean the unlovable things.
I mean, well, hatred, and don’t I embody that now? Why
are you telling me I’ll love myself someday, if I can’t imagine it now?
Someday, I won’t be afraid to smile in the mirror.
One day, I won’t do it to check for errant spinach.
Someday I’ll forgive myself, won’t live deep in my gut or tight in my jaw.
Someday I’ll forget to measure my affection, forget to hold onto shame.
*
Someday I’ll Love Teo Mungaray
After Ocean Vuong; Roger Reeves; Frank O’Hara
Someday I won’t have to call myself You to say something nice,
won’t have to make a ghost tell me he loves me. Someday displeasure
won’t be the foreman of my gut, of my jaw. One day, I’ll have a smile
unmeasured. I’ll pay no attention to my breath, to my bouncing legs.
Someday, I’ll love Teo Mungaray.
Someday I’ll find it easy to say Yes (or No). Someday,
*
Writing ‘Someday I’ll Love Teo Mungaray’
I’ve found a poem impossible to write, despite its lineage. Ocean and Roger and Frank have all written it before and I can’t write it. Isn’t it ironic that the person who told me to write “Someday I’ll Love Teo Mungaray” is named Hope? I can’t find a way in. I tried to tell myself I’d forgive myself. I tried to tell myself I’d forget to measure affection, to hold onto shame, but I know I won’t. I’ve locked myself into so many puzzle boxes, I’ve forgotten the necessary sequence to free myself. Have you seen one of those boxes? The wooden Japanese boxes that contain nothing but the satisfaction of the opening? I’ve never been satisfied, to say the least. I began with a worry, as if I could trick myself into the poem. If I tell myself I’ll never love myself, won’t some part of me find offense? If I call something unlovable, won’t I think of ways to make them lovable? Entomologists love their bugs, and herpetologists their snakes. Even sadists love their amount of torture and generals their war. Everything I think of finds its admirer. I live in my head, in my gut, in my jaw, and each space tightens at night.
*
I’m frustrated with loving myself. I can’t trust myself
to love myself. Inauthentic, a lie to say I love you.
I can’t find a way into myself to say to myself
someday I’ll love Teo Mungaray.
*
I’m giving up on writing this poem.
I’ve tried three different ways to say
someday I’ll love myself, and none of them
has been believable. It sounds fake in my ears.
Not everything can be hopeful. Not everything
can be tied off with a ribbon. I’ve made displeasure
the measure of my life so far. I live in my gut
and my jaw, and each space tightens at night.
Last night I dreamed again
that I was chasing love in the form of a man
whose name I didn’t know, and who couldn’t love me back,
though he took pity enough to stand beside me.
Though I’ve made pity my enemy,
it’s what I’m most accustomed to.
I keep trying to put it into words how much
I don’t care. Except I do care. Except
I keep losing the energy to do anything about it.
If I make a ghost tell me he loves me, is that good enough?
*
The only way I can get to the good is to name the bad.
I don’t name the good, I point to what’s left over.
I have a talent for cruelty. I have a talent for displeasure.
I have made each the measure of my life so far. The day
when I can say I love myself doesn’t exist in my world.
I live in my gut and my jaw. Each space tightens at night.
No one can sleep next to all my restless turning.
I’ve tried drugs and darkness and fifteen-pound blankets.
Not everything can end tied up with hopeful ribbons.
Some things are unlovable, though I find an admire.
for everything but myself. I have vicious thoughts
that burn the edges of my dreams. Every celluloid
image melts in the blaze. Every time I dream,
I feel the haunts creep in. I’ve lost track of these ghosts.
*
A Poem Incomplete and Never to be Finished
I feel the haunts creep in. I’ve lost track of the ghosts.
Every time I dream, I make a ghost tell me he loves me.
Is that good enough? I live in my gut and my jaw.
Each space tightens at night. I have a talent for cruelty.
I have a talent for displeasure, and I’ve made it
the measure of my life so far. Not everything can be tied up
with hopeful ribbons. Someday I’ll love Teo Mungaray.
Teo Mungaray is a queer, chronically ill, latinx poet. He holds an MFA from Pacific University of Oregon and is pursuing his doctorate at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He is a co-founder and co-EIC of Cotton Xenomorph. His poems have recently appeared in or are forthcoming from Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Barrelhouse Magazine, ANMLY, Gulf Coast, The Shade Journal, and Waxwing. He has a cat named Lysistrata. You can find him on twitter @teomungaray.
