Posponiendo La Verdad Y Otros Poemas.

This is my first encounter with the poetry of Baha Zaino or Baharuddin Zainal, and the experience has left me with an edifying feeling. Overall, the verse (both in the original and translated versions) is carefully crafted with a great sensitivity to the lyricism, and the effect is a musicality that resonates in the mind long after one has read the poems. Occasionally the lines have the quality of a ghazal, and this is especially the case in poems that address the beloved/lover, who is sometimes a woman, sometimes God. Baha's literary concerns are varied. Poetry communicates a wide range of concerns, from social and political injustice to love, religion, culture, nature, and civilization.

The tone of what can properly be called his "protest" is always bold, direct, urbane and honest: Baha's voice does not spin meaninglessly even as he exudes sympathy for the dispossessed and contempt for their oppressors. The person is unequivocal in his condemnation of tyranny in all its forms

Agnes S. K. Yeow - University of Malaya, Malaysia