[Verse 1]
Down the front of your shin, skin thin as paper,
Lies a bone the Romans named for music, not for labor,
Tibia, they called it, same word used for a flute,
Hollowed out of elk leg, breathing out a tune,
Carve the marrow, cut the holes, let the melody take root,
Your shinbone is an instrument you never learned to toot.
[Verse 2]
Beside it runs a sliver, slender as a needle,
Fibula's its name, a brooch that pinned a people's
Roman cloaks together with a clasp made of bronze,
Same thin shape, same quiet job, holding what's upon,
It's not the pillar, not the post that takes the brunt,
It's the pin beside the post, the understated stunt.
[Chorus]
Tibia's the flute bone, blow a note and hum it,
Fibula's the brooch pin, clasp it, don't you dumb it,
One bone bears the body's weight, the other barely wears it,
Malleoli knock like hammers, ankle bumps that pair it,
Shin in front, brooch beside, learn the names and keep the rhyme,
Flute and pin, a skeleton duet every single time.
[Verse 3]
Only a sixth of your standing load the fibula will shoulder,
Mostly there for muscle grip, a passenger, beholder,
So when a jaw gets shattered, surgeons come a-borrowing,
Slice a piece of fibula, no missing step tomorrow in walking,
Graft it where the chin bone cracked, vessels stitched and threaded,
A leg bone wearing a brand new face, nobody expected.
[Verse 4]
Down at the ankle, two bumps knock, medial and lateral,
Malleoli, little hammers, tapping out a pattern natural,
Tibia's bump sits inside, fibula's rides the outer,
Together forming the mortise, the joint your ankle's built about,
Pivot, roll, and carry you across the kitchen floor,
Two little hammers quietly holding up a door.
[Bridge]
Percivall Pott broke his own leg, bone poking through the skin,
He refused the amputation they were certain to begin,
He healed, he lived, he later penned in seventeen sixty-five
The book on ankle fractures — proof a snapped bone can survive.
The shaft sits close to daylight, just a whisper under skin,
That's why the shinbone opens up when other bones stay hid within.
[Chorus]
Tibia's the flute bone, blow a note and hum it,
Fibula's the brooch pin, clasp it, don't you dumb it,
One bone bears the body's weight, the other barely wears it,
Malleoli knock like hammers, ankle bumps that pair it,
Shin in front, brooch beside, learn the names and keep the rhyme,
Flute and pin, a skeleton duet every single time.
[Outro]
Skin-close shinbone, breaking open, closer than it should,
Flute and brooch together, understood as understood,
Little hammers, borrowed bone, a surgeon's clever heist,
Tibia and fibula — now etched in mind precise.