Tiernomuffin

Still digging through my notes looking for translations to post.

It's hanamiku toxic doomed yuri. I really like this song<3

Since this is a duet, I wanted to color-code the lyrics, but the tumblr colors are hard to read... Anyway, normal text for Miku, bold for flower. Enjoy! :)

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Madoromi - Ressentiment

Having become satisfied, I'm crumbling without a sound. There's no saving me – stop my breathing.

We loved each other, and now, I died alone. But to show loneliness is simply stupid. We burst each other open, and now remain unhealing. The petals thirsted and dried up; I hold them close, together with my pain, and live on.

This revolving ideal is just A tamed form of happiness, so mix some blood into it. Head spinning, this dizziness that crushes my weakness down Is wavering while looking for a meaning.

Having fallen into pieces, the two of us break into dance As this mundane pain colors our days. Ah, just like this, I hold my breath, And swallow down even this tense sadness.

(Crumbling down and swaying,) Even if I feign loneliness, (Crumbling down and swaying,) My affection for you won't go away. (Crumbling down and swaying,) But is your happiness (Crumbling down and swaying,) One where I am needed?

We deceived each other, and now, you died. If you're going to laugh while still covered in rust– You forgot, and now it peeled away, That worthless disguise of yours. Just keep singing, empty as you are, While hanging onto a meaningless prayer!

If it's allowed, even for a person like me, Then grant me the chance to have one minuscule dream. It's too late. I don't even want your kindness now… I'm sinking into a beautiful red color.

Listen to my selfish wish – hug me over and over, Don't say goodbye yet. Stay by my side. Ah, unable to have even that wish granted, I dance with the pain I spat out.

Now I'm crumbling down. I embrace my happiness And dance with the petals still green with envy. Ah, just like this, I hold my breath, And, mundane as I am, I waver.

(Crumbling down and swaying,) Won't you at least (Crumbling down and swaying,) Make my last wish come true? (Crumbling down and swaying,) Your happiness is (Crumbling down and swaying,) Going to swallow me whole.

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The more I become able to understand songs as I listen to them, the more I find myself wanting to make my own translations for songs I previously could only understand through other people's words. That is to say, there were some lines in Shama's subtitles that I couldn't quite wrap my head around, so I ended up translating it on my own some months ago, lol.

Not that the translation in the video is bad (my translation is likely not too different), but there were certain lines I understood differently and/or wanted to talk about, so I figured I'd give this song a try and post it here. There's some long notes at the end of the post for those who enjoy knowing the meaning of things, too. From a huge Clay Pool fan (made clear by the amount of art of her in my main blog), I hope you enjoy! ^_^

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NILFRUITS - Shama*

An imprisoned femme fatale dressed in stripes Gulps down the juice squeezed from the masses. Night after night, she hangs herself, drunkenly playing with fire When the little girl's image melts off.

My discomfort was working overtime. My mind was devoid of thought.** Then, after hanging my head indifferently – "I win." It's all-or-nothing. I give in. Obediently, passingly, selfishly Coaxing a negative over a positive.

If shallow love can still be called love, then Unfortunately, looks like I'm a fool. After saying "I don't even want to talk" I realized that was self-protection. If you reaffirmed your shallow self, Then what would that make me? An irritating glass and foundation. Now, expose your tongue out, just like a dog.

An imprisoned femme fatale dressed in wickedness, Seeming to stir up the Deuce squeezed from the masses, Night after night, she dismisses will, playing with fire When the prison of love affairs is lifted.

The self-proclaimed scale lifted the military cup to the side where heads were lighter. I can only see it as transferring to a decanter, A fool who arranged her moves like a wall.

If shallow love can still be called love, then Unfortunately, looks like I'm a fool. "It's not like I want to let go," I say, but It's not like I couldn't tell, either… See, my shallow self's reason for being Is the sacrifice of a perfect-fitting narrow path. If you inhaled brandy through your skin, You'd become erratic and playful.

If shallow love can still be called love, then Unfortunately, looks like I'm a fool. After saying "It's not like I can't talk" I realized that was a misjudgement. If shallow love is still called love, then*** Unfortunately, looks like I'm a heel. I'd drink your goodbye kisses a thousand times over.**** See through my wickedness, just like a dog.

Yes, just like a dog.

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*The title, 紗痲, is not really a word, making it hard to translate, but the individual kanji used to write it do have meaning. The "sha" part, 紗, means "gauze", while the "ma" part, 痲, means "numbness". The latter kanji seems to be out of use nowadays, having been consolidated into the kanji 麻, referring to the hemp plant and its fibers. Thus, 痲 can be used as an alternate spelling in words like 痲痺 (mahi, "paralysis"), 痲薬 (mayaku, "narcotic"), or 痲酔 (masui, "anesthesia"). According to NILFRUITS, he chose these kanji for their visual impact, wanting the song name to have a nice sound and a sort of feminine beauty. Furthermore, the actual reading of the title was taken from "おしゃま" (oshama), meaning "precocious little girl". Knowing all this doesn't make the title any easier to translate...

**The sentence used here, "空空が寂寂している" (kuukuu ga jakujaku shiteiru, "emptiness is lonesome") is a reference to "空空寂寂" (kuukuujakujaku, lit. "empty and lonesome"), a Buddhist term that denies the existence of things, thus making them empty (in simple terms). It can also refer to a state of mind in which one is detached from everything, becoming unconstrained, which is what I ultimately referenced in my translation.

***The usual "上っ面な愛を愛と呼べんなら" (uwattsura na ai wo ai to yoben nara) gets changed to "上っ面な愛を愛と呼ぶんなら" (uwattsura na ai wo ai to yobun nara) in the last bit of the song. Admittedly, this line has been bothering me for years, lol. "X to yoben nara" uses a potential verb, meaning "if you can call it X", while "X to yobun nara" uses a plain verb, meaning "if you call it X" or "if you will call it X". Iirc when I asked a japanese friend about this years ago, they said this change didn't have any relevant nuance, but I still wanted to reflect it on my translation. (Also, just to make things more fun, "uwattsura na ai wo ai to yoben nara" doesn't just mean "If shallow love can be called love", but also "If shallow love can't be called love"! Just a little fun fact to help you better understand the song. :) )

****The original line, "お別れのキスも何杯目" (owakare no kisu mo nanbaime) uses the counter for cups 杯 (hai, here pronounced as "bai") instead of the usual 回 (kai) used for occurrences of an action. If the latter was used, this would mean something like "I'd take your goodbye kisses countless times", but since the counter was changed, it becomes something like "I'd take countless cups of your goodbye kisses". I figured my translation was a more fun way to make it more natural. :)

Long time no see! ^_^/

Realized I had some translations piled up, and since I'd like to translate more as part of my japanese studies, I decided to revisit this blog.

First up is Matchmate, Sakito Homura's character song from Bakuage Sentai Boonboomger. I haven't really checked if others have translated these songs (I assume they have, but I'm fandom-shy), but since Sakito's my fav, I wanted to understand his song by myself. Turns out it was quite the challenge, but I'm gonna comment more on that later, lol. Lots of notes ahead, but for now, enjoy the song! ^_^

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Sakito Homura (Yu Miyazawa) - Matchmate

Let's race over to that goal. You're not taking the first place from me. You wanna say something? Just say it. This memory won't go away. If we can't agree on tastes, Then no doubt are values don't match. But once we get into position, we're all on the same starting line!*

Time flew away in a flash And I didn't have a single good memory, But I can say it now: This place Is pretty damn nice! Home town? Manners? To hell with those! Crashing and stumbling are all part of the course, so go for it! Once it hits you, that feeling Isn't half bad, yeah.

A taste I wouldn't have found on my own, The spiciness of this curry – nothing can beat it! If you can't get serious, Then matches and fights will wait in every corner.** In the eyes of society that's called a failure, But that's just one of my parts.*** The sparks that flew back in that day Became fireworks for us to gaze at and chat away.

Rush out beyond the finish line! Push ahead, far into the distance! I'll mix every color together And paint a landscape. If there's a bend in the road ahead, Ride it out with a wide turn. Once you look back, you'll see how good it felt!

No matter how fast I run, I know there's folks who'll keep up with me. That's right. But after going on different courses, How's it feel, taking control of your wheel? If it's fun, you win!

The road I chose is ridden with potholes,**** And it's not even paved. Once in a while, I'll gather my might And aim for a brand new day. If you want to go straight, that's fine too. I ain't got time to kneel down. The future's not the cheapskate you think!

If you ever take the wrong path You can just hit the brakes, so what's it matter? The shape I see right now In the middle of this ever-changing town…

Sure, there's things that never change, too. Everyone's dealing with their own stuff. No matter when, no matter where, This hand sign links us together. The life we embarked on Is headed towards fine weather, So let's raise our cups and laugh!

Let's race over to that goal. You're not taking the first place from me. You wanna say something? Just say it. This memory won't go away. The place that my friends love, The place waiting for their return – I'll protect it for sure. Ready, go!

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*The word in this line, "ヨーイドン" (yoidon) is used both here and in the last line, where I translated it as "Ready, go!". In the last line, it's followed by "でよ" (de yo), a more assertive use of particles than the "だろ" (daro) used here. While "Ready, go!" is its direct meaning, the word is also often used to mean "people starting from the same point." Because of the context, and because "だろ" expresses a supposition or a want for agreement from the speaker, I figured this translation better expressed the meaning they wanted to convey in this line ("When we get into position, we're all starting from the same point, right?"), but I still feel like something might be lost by not using the same words on both lines...

**The original line, "勝負も喧嘩もナントカの華" (shoubu mo kenka mo nantoka no hana, "both matches and fights are the flowers of who-knows-what") refers to the saying "火事と喧嘩は江戸の華" (kaji to kenka wa edo no hana, "fires and fights are the flowers of Edo"), which alludes to how both things happened frequently in the city during the Edo period. While googling it didn't bring any results, looking it up on Twitter I managed to find quite a few examples of people using this "nantoka no hana" phrase to refer to things that are bound to happen/things that happen frequently. While I think the translation I went with expresses this meaning right, I believe there's also a meaning of "things that are bad, but so common that they become a part of something's charm" that I wasn't able to convey properly. I hope this note makes up for that!

***Rather than "sides that make up a person", the "parts" used here (部品, "buhin") is more like "components" (like parts of a car, for example).

****More literally, this line only really says "ridden with potholes", with "the road I chose" being something I added to make the line easier to understand. Given the context of the song, I don't think this addition is wrong, but I do feel like it's dangerously close to "adding a meaning that isn't there", which could be misleading. If this kind of thing bothers you, you can find a more literal translation here.

I've reached the point where I can start translating a song and be done within an hour, but this one actually took a few days... I'd love to say it's because of how long the lyrics are, but I was already stuck the moment I started, lol.

As expected of a character song, the lyrics are full of personality, so I wanted to convey that correctly. That being said, Sakito's way of speaking doesn't exactly match my usual flowery style, so it was hard, lol. I'm also very fond of adding lots of punctuation, so it was hard getting rid of the feeling of "this sounds too stiff for Sakito..." without adding too many exclamation marks (I tried to only add them where they matched the nuance of the lines, prommy).

On top of that, the lines in the song don't exactly connect in a clear way, so I had to analyze and add a bunch of stuff in order to make the translation easier to understand (I also added car and race-related words whenever possible, but that's just me having fun). I believe these changes are within what's reasonable and don't affect the meaning of the song, but I like to be transparent with this stuff, so please check out the literal translation linked above if you'd like to have a clearer idea of what the song does and doesn't say! (Just keep in mind that nuance isn't conveyed correctly in a literal translation).

That's all I had to say. This song's adorable. Thanks for reading!

I translated NILFRUITS' song HARUNI some weeks ago, then I forgot to post it here :) It was fun to translate!

My japanese is self-taught, and I haven’t been learning it for a long time, so there might be some mistakes. Any notes or corrections are welcome!

NILFRUITS - HARUNI

I felt vividly dizzy From the rightness everyone sought after. For us, who cried while hiding in the back of that feeling The present is still deadly. Alone, on the verge of tears, paralyzed* from sadness. I did it again. I already failed. I sank into the deep sea. Ari, ori, haberi, imasokari** If we could meet inside a delusory dream…

Bet, bet, bet on spring. We're going, but there's no meaning, is there? Yes, Mailey***, let me touch it, let me touch it, let me touch it, More, tell me about the days when you wished for what's beyond. Bet, bet, bet on spring. We say, but there's no meaning, is there? Yes, Mailey, let me touch them, let me touch them, let me touch them, More, those sprouting feelings that we shared. Give me an answer.

The silence blooming from the vase by the window Smelled terribly sweet. As if to shake off even the preparations for dinner, I put it off and go to bed.

Flowers are crimson, willows are green.**** If we could meet inside such a future, If my dream could come true…

Bet, bet, bet on spring. We'll go, to a place that doesn't need meaning. So many, let it overflow, let it overflow, let it overflow, More, the moonless night that swallowed you has cleared up.

Bet, bet, bet on spring. We'll go, to a tomorrow that doesn't need meaning. Yes, Mailey, make me go mad, make me go mad, make me go mad, More, all those thunderstorms you poured, Take them away.

Bet, bet, bet on spring. We'll go. Bet, bet, bet on spring. We'll sprout.

I'll understand the meaning when I reach my end.

* From what I understood after looking it up, these are ancient japanese verbs. They all kind of mean "to be". The way they are used here is actually a phrase used to memorize verb conjugation (also this specific phrase is present in the lyrics of Inokori Sensei. I thought this was interesting since that's v flower's demo song, and this is one of Ci flower's demo songs, too…)

** I think "金縛り" refers specifically to sleep paralysis. According to jisho it can also mean "being tied down with money"

*** I imagine "メイリー" here is a name, since I couldn't find any other meaning for it and Niru often puts names in his lyrics. There's no meaning, is there? Not sure if "Mailey" would be the correct way to write it, I just used what jisho said!

I translated my favorite song from teniwoha's album NO BOY (my favorite out of the album-exclusive songs, I mean). A big reason why I started trying to learn japanese was so I would be able to understand the songs from this album that most likely wouldn't get translated, so I'll definitely translate all the songs, eventually. :)

My japanese is self-taught, and I haven’t been learning it for a long time, so there might be some mistakes. Any notes or corrections are welcome!

teniwoha - Uta ni Naranai Hana wa Nai (There's not a single flower that wouldn't become a song)

It's like I'd been growing a flower that would never become a song. (Lotus, lily, Chinese lantern) It's like I'd been humming a song that would never become a flower. (Moonflower, fringed pink) Indigo, ultramarine, pale yellow, vermillion, crimson – I can't just forget them. "Don't worry. Everything's okay," I lied.

Goodbye bloomed and tore us apart so as to block our field of view. Alone, I cried at nighttime so that the flowers that remained would not wither. I hold and drop the scattered seeds for the sake of connecting. May they one day sprout again with a different color, scent, and name.

Even if the season ripens, its roots are still getting entangled. (Gentian, chrysanthemum, camellia) Walking is impossible. Let it spill now. (Hydrangea, peach, Chinese bellflower) It bloomed without any seeds or tricks, didn't it? Surely that couldn't have been reproduced. I have trouble. Love probably Doesn't belong to anyone, I think.

The song that bloomed from my heart was my only guide. I'll just sing until it reaches to you.

My memories of you are like incense of flowers blooming from every page. I find myself looking for that lingering scent each time they open.

Goodbye bloomed and tore us apart so as to block our field of view. Alone, I cried at nighttime so that the remaining flowers would not wither. I hold and drop the scattered seeds for the sake of connecting. May they one day sprout again with a different color, scent, and name.

I'm sure that must have been an illusion too, so I'm not going to run to it. "Don't worry. Everything's okay." I'm walking as I lie.

I'm singing so as to not wither.

Japanese parsley, shepherd's purse, cudweed, chickweed, (Nipplewort, turnip, radish)*

*The plants listed here are the traditional names of the 七草, the seven spring flowers eaten during the Festival of Seven Herbs or Nanakusa no Sekku (七草の節句), a Japanese custom in which seven-herb rice porridge is eaten during the 7th day of January.