Gleanings

By Jennifer Hashmi

This is a collection of verses, and some have been taken from an earlier collection, also called Gleanings, first published in Calcutta in 1993. There are several about the Christian experience, titled according to the calendar of the churchs year. Then there are a few about the experience of nonduality. Some tell a story. Some are for fun. They are all about life or observations on life. Intimations of Joy points toward the nature of real spiritual life for which we are born and a vision of what that might be like. Whatever is reflected in any particular poem, the underlying philosophy is that life has meaning and how we live it is very important. In the end, we realize that we are pilgrims who are making our way back through many obstacles to a paradise whose nature is spontaneity and joyfulness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Sep 6, 2017
• ISBN: 9781546281757

Jennifer Hashmi

Jennifer Hashmi was born in Bradford in 1938. She was educated in Bingley Grammar School and trained as a speech therapist in Leicester School of Speech Therapy. After practicing as a speech therapist in Yorkshire for three years she completed a two-year theology course at College of Ascension, Birmingham. In 1964 she sailed to India and lived in Delhi for forty-one years. Until 1976 she served in the Church of North India as Parish Worker, initially for St. James Church in old Delhi, and later in the parish of Ajmer in Rajasthan. She was also during part of this time manager of a holiday home in Shimla. In 1977 she married Salman Hashmi who was principal of Zakir Husain College, University of Delhi. They had a son and a daughter. In 2004 her husband passed away so at the end of 2005 Mrs Hashmi returned to Britain with her daughter. She now lives in London with her daughter, son-in-law, and small grandson.

Book preview

Incarnation

God was in the molecules

and he showed himself in the carbon and the hydrogen.

He came in water, air, and blood,

in earth and fire and flesh,

but we could not see him.

(We cannot see our own face.)

So the Spirit brooded over Mary

and the Word became Man,

carbon of our carbon,

hydrogen of our hydrogen,

oxygen of our oxygen,

who was author of our nature,

now bearer of the same,

and subject to its’ law.

Now the Spirit dwelt among us

and we could see his face

and another law in action -

survival of the weak!

Sacrifice, surrender,

for power and domination

were the tenets of the Spirit,

and we looked on appalled.

Now we cannot see it,

(since we cannot seen our own face),

but his spiritual nature,

medium of life,

is shared amongst us all

in a mode that we can see.

For at the holy table

in a sacramental sign

he comes to us for ever

in the bread and the wine.

All the World’s a Stage

Christmas 1987

God said, I love, and the world was born.

Myriad forms leapt and danced on to a revolving stage,

each to perform his part and then retire.

Tragedy, comedy, mystery, illusion -

all included in the great divine bonanza.

But the players forgot their parts and lost the theme!

Confusion and dismay!

So God himself strode on the stage to set the story straight.

Then some turned round and said, "Who’s he to interfere?

Let us not be led astray.

He’s put the whole thing in reverse and changed the end!"

Yes, complained a king, "who’s he to take the role of hero

and make us subject to his act? He’s made the drama his!"

Between the speaker and the spoken, fumed a priest, "who’s he

to march upon our stage and say we’ve got it wrong!"

He said the Word is ‘Love’ and showed us how it’s played,

whispered a boy into the ear of his lamb.

Philosophers affirmed, "The question first arises

to whom the Word is spoken. Then the word is guessed."

Can love disperse like vapour?

Will the sun retain its’ heat when the last atom’s spent?

Will the Word, once spoken, be lost in the furthest

reaches of infinite infinity?

The Speaker hears the Word himself.

It is to himself he says, "I am.

I am the Lord of creation and its’ Redeemer.

I am the baby born of Mary and the crucified,

and the universes are an everlasting predicate.

The Word is because I love, and must love

because I am