---
title: "Meine Liebe Mütter"
url: "https://ruthocallaghan.com/poems/meine-liebe-mutter"
updated: 2026-10-12
description: "\"Meine Liebe Mütter\", a poem by Ruth O'Callaghan from Vortices."
---

# Meine Liebe Mütter

You will not expect this letter so soon. I never wrote from our camp\
being your ham-fisted Hans – but you knew I would be home on leave.\
My face is still wet from the tears you wept as I marched quickly away\
– I may not say to where. The Kaiser has ordered that those we love\
now have to be informed if we are injured or if death is imminent.

The Kaiser wishes to inform you that I conducted myself with honour.\
We engaged the enemy and the fighting was close but with my brothers\
by my side victory was certain. We did not flinch. It is so important,\
                                                                                                                        Mütter,\
that you understand we never turned our faces away from the enemy.\
For the very first time your clumsy, shy son looked – only to see himself,\
find myself, there in the enemy’s eyes: knew the enemy lay in my own.

Knew also that it was his first time too. His buttons still bright\
                                                                                                             as are mine.

We both drew handguns. Why? We had bayonets! He was fast, I was\
                                                                                                                        faster.\
We both fell face to face yet now I saw in his eyes, felt in my own, no hate.\
His mouth moved. His message seemed urgent. I tried to lean\
                                                                                                             nearer to hear\
his words but his lips went slack so his breath, a sigh, did not reach\
                                                                                                                    my cheek.

His left hand lay on my thigh. I held it. We understood killing is\
                                                                                                             an intimate act.

I am lucid. All is clear. I am not alone. My visitor comes, sniffs, returns each hour.

My papers will be sent to you. I have wrapped my friend’s in mine. His name is Henry.

Ihr liebevoller Sohn, Hans.

_From Vortices (Shoestring Press, 2016)_