The diptych Father and Child by Australian writer Gwen Harwood consists of two poems, each describing the relationship between an unnamed/ungendered speaker and their father at two different stages of life, in childhood and near the father's death. Although the two poems, "Barn Owl" and "Nightfall", differ from one another stylistically, they deal with similar themes, including death and innocence. They both situate their characters in natural spaces, where animals and plants serve as representations of the varieties of life.
The poems were published first in the anthology Australian Poetry (1969) and later in Harwood's Collected Poems (1975), and they represent a significant break from...
