Through the study of change in self, the concept of changing self can mean a complicated process which often involves a dynamic process of development, but sometimes change in self is triggered by traumatic experiences which can either hinder or hasten this process. This aspect of change is evident in several poems by Gwen Harwood, the film "The Matrix-, Peter Goldworthy's novel "Maestro- and the short story "Sky High- by Hannah Robert.
In the poem the "glass jar- the young boy's innocence is usurped when he is introduced to the complexity of the sexual relationship. Harwood's use of music i.e. "score- is to represent a spiritual dimension: an emotional world where the boy cannot comprehend and no child can be part of. The persona's inability to comprehend what he had witnesses, added with his fear of night creatures which he tried to dispel by capturing light in a jar " to exorcize monsters that whispering would rise nightly from the intricate wood that ringed his bed- further intensified his horror and loss of innocence and faith.
The use of religious imagery and biblical allusions in the poem; mainly in the 1st and 2nd stanzas represented the child's faith in the sun i.e. religion. The title itself is a religious term "The Glass Jar-, a symbol of innocence. Also the religious term "resurrected- in the last stanza is used to describe that the sun's return is ironic because the child has lost his faith. The boy has experienced a change in self as a result of his confronting experience and has changed from innocent and nave child growing to understand and accept what life entails.
Harwood's poem "Father and child- also sees a change in self of the narrator which is triggered by a traumatic experience.
The pivotal point in the first section Barn owl- begins in the fourth stanza of the poem i.e. the killing of the bird, where the persona loses their innocence and is abruptly initiated into the world of death and responsibility.
