Mizuko Jizo is a story whose title carries memories of prayer and loss. Through the image of a jizo statue for unborn or lost children, it can be read as a work that looks at private pain, family silence, and emotions left in a place.

From prayers entrusted to a jizo statue arise a hard-to-speak loss and the memory of a place.

This poetry collection by Tetsuya Okada sets the climate of southern Kyushu, with its sea and mountains, behind poems that catch light and shadow, local memory, and the feel of daily life. As its title suggests, placing brightness and shade side by side, it quietly resonates with feelings rooted in place.

Sunlight over the sea and shadows from the mountains illuminate the memories of people living in the south.