After Malaya's independence in 1957, he lived in Kuala Lumpur and worked in the national language regulatory board, the Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka until 1985.

[1] The author of several collections of poetry, more than twenty plays, one novel (Tulang-Tulang Berserakan - "Scattered bones"), numerous short stories and journalistic articles.

The prominent Malaysian critic Syed Husin Ali, one of his closest friends, wrote about him stating: "Usman is popularly considered, and most justifiably too, as perhaps the best poet in the Malay language.

He is a master at weaving words into striking phrases, sentences and verses that are of exceptional classical beauty and sometimes appear to be nostalgic and even escapist" [4] .

Soviet orientalist B.B.Parnickel assessed Usman's creativity, writing: "With rich, euphonious, in a way traditional language, he wrote a lot and enthusiastically about his homeland, love, freedom, and the wave of his emotions affects truly magically his readers" [5]Several places and honours were named after him, including: