I chose a woodland creature
a stag with branching antlers
and said, “We saw each other
while walking through the forest.

I stopped, it turned and shivered
before it bounded backwards,
so leaving me to wonder…
Is that what you are asking?”

They nodded, smiled, and answered
the while suppressing laughter,
“Did you not try to call him?
reach out, get any closer?”

“Not really—just beheld him.”
But thinking twice, I added,
“The moment held some meaning,
some something, maybe longing.”

And only now I realize
my choice was goddamn Wilde,
off drooling in the forest;
off tracking shadows dancing;
all yearning sed non tangens.

My friends elucidated
the meaning of my answers.
The rest I have forgotten
besides the third and final:

“We laughed because the creature
that’s chosen for the last one
is s’pposed to be your partner—
yours blinked and ran away!”

They told me not to worry.
(It’s, after all, a game.)