The fourteenth poem from my poetry collection Conception.

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Sleepless nights

I never knew you cross, on edge, snappy,
until we shared a child
and lost our own identities
among bottles, baby clothes, bibs
and bodysuits of every tone.
Before, we still had time to talk.
The evening hours were filled with just us two,
a glass of wine, a leisurely sunset stroll,
or you would ask what I wanted to do.
Now nights of nappy changes,
fumbled cold feeds, coughs and colic cries
have loosed in you a quick temper
that sleep kept well controlled.
You’re not the man I knew,
or thought I knew.
Yet, patience stretched past elasticity,
our love remains intact,
if not entirely stress mark-free.