無条件幸福論 by SuG
 

I'm having trouble making sense of three lines from this song. Here they are with my translations:

ただ会いたくて 声も無くしそうで
I was about to lose even my voice from just wanting to see you.

でも会えなくて 夢さえ恨んだ
But I couldn't see you and I hated even dreams.

日々薄れてく 記憶を手探りで 感触をただ愛した

That last line I won't even attempt to translate because it hardly makes sense to me. What does it mean?

The first line doesn't make sense to me either because I don't see how wanting to see someone would cause a person to lose their voice.

For the second line, what is the connection between wanting to see someone and hating dreams?

The complete song lyrics are here.

I think you are confusing yourself by treating the line 「ただ会いたくて 声も無くしそうで」 as if it were a complete sentence when it isn't. All it has is two continuative verb forms (the latter is an auxiliary verb to be exact.).

「ただ会いたくて, 声も無くしそうで, でも会えなくて夢さえ恨んだ」 is the complete sentence with three continuative forms and one affirmation form at the very end.

「日々薄れてく 記憶を手探りで 感触をただ愛した」, which is a very poorly constructed sentence using two direct objects （「記憶」　＆　「感触」） with other words in between and two words of a similar meaning　（「手探り」　＆　「感触」）, would roughly mean:

"I simply loved the feel of of the memories which I groped for and which faded away day by day."

:ywave: Thanks for rearranging the words and your insights. Yes, you're right. I thought that the first line was a complete sentence.

You seem to interpret ただ as "simply." Someone else said that ただ before a verb is used to add emphasis. They interpreted it like this:

What do you think?

I cannot say what I did is very different. By adding "simply", I actually meant to emphasize the action.

Wwwwow~ You're translating Japanese songs into English. Nice work! I'm just trying to translate English songs into other languages. You really doing a nice work.
Sorry, I can't understand Japanese, so I just say something about it. When you're dreaming about someone who you want to see but you can't, it's a disaster.

Hello. Could it also be that he hates dreams because he wants to meet her in them, but doesn't?

That would be my understanding. Either that or she is cold to him in his dreams.

What do you think about the idea that he hates dreams because he sees her in them, as if to tease him since he can't meet her in reality?

I think that is not only possible but it may be the best interpretation so far. He appears to actively hate the dreams.

What do you mean by "actively?" Wouldn't いる have to be somehow connected to 恨んだ to make it active?

Because of さえ, wouldn't it be more likely that "couldn't meet in dreams" is the correct interpretation?

会えなくて 夢さえ恨んだ

I couldn't meet you in reality so I hated it. I couldn't meet you even in dreams so I hated them too.

　

I said "actively" because one rarely says "I love (or hate) my dreams." in the first place. I sensed a rather strong hatred there. 「いる」 makes the tense progressive but does not change the degree of hatred.

I am seeing this さえ as "even", too. He probably hated many things in life and he even hated his dreams. Though there is no mention of "meeting" in actual words but I still think it is a valid interpretation.

Thanks, I wouldn't have noticed that. Saying that he couldn't meet his girlfriend in dreams goes along nicely with the surrounding lyrics, but since you said there is a strong emotion there I decided to try to make that come through in the translation.

At the end of the song there is this line:

傷つけてしまう夜もあるだろう 分かち合えない想いもあるだろう

Who is the subject for 傷つけてしまう夜もあるだろう? Do you think this is talking about them hurting each other, or the singer hurting his girlfriend?

The last part of the song is very tricky; in fact, I would not hesitate to call it clumsy.

Narrator says この先は僕なりに言葉紡ぐから聞いておくれ. If we are to take this line literally, then what follows it (everything said in the last pair of quotation marks) has got to be his words. However, the first line within the quotation marks sounds very feminine --- ふたり以上の恋があるとしてもふたりは’ふたり’を選 ぶのでしょう. After this line, it sounds all masculine again.

If we can pretend that it is OK for two people to speak in one pair of quotation marks, the subject for 傷つけてしまう夜もあるだろう would be the narrator.　　

This band is a visual kei band. Are you familiar with this type of music? I would go further and say that it is a neo visual kei band, which is different from the older types like X Japan. In neo visual kei it is normal for men to dress, act, and speak like women. That's why I think it's just the singer speaking at the end while his girlfriend listens. If that's the case, do you think that the subject is still the narrator? Is he saying, "There might be nights when we'll end up hurting each other," or is he saying, "There might be nights when I'll end up hurting you?"

If one were to take the words at face value, the subject would be "I". However, to make it blend into the context better, the subject would be "we".

In your previous message it sounded like you thought the subject was "I," but now it sounds like you think it is "we." Which one do you think it is?

I've already translated and uploaded the video here. Seeing it may or may not provide insight into which one it really is.

"I". And I said this without reading translation.

I just have very little trust of this author for what he says in the last quote for the reasons I had already mentioned. I am saying "I" because if I didn't, I would feel like I never went to school in Japan and never spoke the language. However, compared to the 2-person-in-1-quote factor, the I-or-we issue is of almost no importance.