Kadamanitta Ramakrishnan deserves special mention in modern Malayalam poetry. Popularly known as poet-MLA, he played a pivotal role in the development of modern poetry in Kerala. His poems embody the fragrance of ancient Kerala heritage, the virtue of performing arts like Padayani and the robust rhythm of traditional art forms. And for this very purpose, he discards the technicality of metre.

Humanism is the hallmark of his poetry. Greatly influenced by the naxalite tendencies and Marxian ideologies of the 1960's and 70's, he made the poetic muse a means to fight against the veil of pretence and feelings of atrocity of the society. 'Kurathi', 'Santha' and 'Makanodu' are the important works of Kadamanitta.

In his poem 'Kurathi', Kurathi represents the suppressed slave class who attains ferocity and questions the establishments. His 'Santha' is an intense and novel experience of pure love. 'Makanodu' reveals the degraded faces of the city.

He had immense opportunities to interact with the outstanding literary personalities of that period through the many 'Kavisammelans' which were a rage at that time. And exposure to giants and their works during the formative period moulded the writer in him whose poetic imagination was enriched by an uncanny penchant for black-humour rarely seen in Malayalam.

Such was his command of the language that he often converted spoken and newspaper language into poetic language in addition to enriching Malayalam language with several new words. His poetry has touched almost all conceivable topics, but more often it touched issues like environmental degradation and the march of concrete structures towards the villages of Kerala.