This morning, I read Wynken, Blynken and Nod to my younger two children in school. I decided to glance at the other poems we have read and found Twins.
This poem made the three of us laugh when we read it. When I glanced at it again this morning, I was reminded of my friend Beth, whose Wonder Twins have just turned four.
My grandmother was a twin, I have twin boy cousins, and I lived in constant fear with each of my pregnancies that I would have twins. A few months ago, my friend Dawn and I were sitting at her kitchen table, discussing her newly-discovered pregnancy.
"I'm afraid I'll have twins," she told me.
"Don't worry," I said. "I had that fear as well. I'm sure it'll just be one baby in there."
I spoke too soon. Way too soon. Dawn and her husband are not only expecting twins, but they found out last week, they're expecting twin boys.
I think they should name one of them John. Don't you?
Twins
Henry S. Leigh
In form and feature, face and limb,
I grew so like my brother,
That folks got taking me for him,
And each for one another.
It puzzled all our kith and kin,
It reached an awful pitch;
For one of us was born a twin,
Yet not a soul knew which.
One day (to make the matter worse),
Before our names were fixed,
As we were being washed by the nurse
We got completely mixed;
And thus, you see, by Fate's decree,
(Or rather, nurse's whim),
My brother John got christened me,
And I got christened him.
The fatal likeness even dogged
My footsteps when at school,
And I was always getting flogged,
For John turned out a fool.
I put this question hopelessly
To every one I knew -
What would you do, if you were me,
To prove that you were you?
Our close resemblance turned the tide
Of my domestic life;
For somehow my intended bride
Became my brother's wife,
In short, year after year the same
Absurd mistakes went on;
And when I died - the neighbors came
