Pre-Paired

Yul not have heard of Chang and Eng

(‘The King and I’ as some have joked),

for nation’s pair, twins, Siamese,

boys tied at birth, condition named,

though if today, ‘conjoined’ as Thai.

They married sisters, lived for years,

gave birth more twenty, ribaldry;

like Bedlam, strangeness unexplained,

exotic terms from cruder age,

those different, odd, deemed circus show.

With modern medicine, such unknown,

though fifty past, remember well.

What mystery, shared body parts -

whose sibling rivalry in charge?

If one would dance, the other must.