In the body of South African writing, Shabbir Banoobhai's is a rare voice with the courage and the artistic skill to articulate a contemporary spirituality convincingly. The utmost simplicity of expression is used to conceal and reveal, at one and the same time, ideas of intense profundity. The poems are often meditative songs of love, longing, and loss in a mystical world, but as often remain rooted in the social and political struggles of this world.