The motif of this work is based on Matsuo Basho's haiku monument "Asa Yosao, Taga Matsushima zo Katagokoro" (“day and night, who waits on Pine Island, with a one-sided heart” translated by Jane Reichhold), which stands quietly in Oshima, a sacred place in Matsushima, with Kenbutsu Shonin on the right side and Matsuo Basho on the left side.
The two figures are linked back-to-back: Kenbutsu Shonin, who is said to have spent 12 years in a stone cave on Oshima reciting 60,000 copies of a sutra, and the haiku poet who yearns for the island, where such a mysterious legend remains.