During the season when cicadas cry, begins a scene, curtained off
Looking down upon us, flower petals, they bloomed in the night
I’m always thinking about you beside me, the whole time, a whole lot
Compared to your back, the moon blooms and vanishes, an ephemeral thing
so I was just looking up at it, absentmindedly, on a summer night.
I’m always thinking
of being at your side
Even if I stretch out my hand, even if it doesn’t reach you, in some way, it feels very warm.
Green, yellow, and red floated and vanished and fell
and the feeling, the insecurity of dyeing myself into what you like hurt, it hurt
I was fading away.
(After the summer festival….)
Projected through glass, it passes through the other side of a wind chime.
I’m always thinking
of you, by my side
If I could make just one vow, I think it would be to continuously,
Eternally, like those flowers, keep on illuminating you. ¹
.
NOTES / INTERPRETATION:
oo1. The word for fireworks in Japanese, hanabi, is written using the character for “flower” (hana) and “fire” (bi). So the flowers being referenced in this line are mainly the fireworks, but can also call to mind the literal blooming flower petals mentioned in the opening verse as well, tying together the beginning and the ending.
Thoughts. For how bittersweet these lyrics are, it’s amazing how upbeat and energizing the music and performance of the song is. It has a fairly involved dance at their lives, including a section (verse 5) where everyone twirls all the way around in place first in one direction and then in the other direction — as if playing out both the fireworks falling and the speaker twisting themselves into a shape that they find painful and inauthentic.
These lyrics are filled with beautiful imagery of fireworks-filled summer festival night in Japan while also capturing the pain that comes from trying to change yourself in order to be liked by someone that you’re in love with — and the longing for a love that you couldn’t bring yourself to fully act upon.
Still, there is nothing but warmth as the song comes to a close.
アリス九號. ★ ALICE NINE.
H.A.N.A.B.I.
祇園盛者の鐘が鳴る (2004)
gion shouja no kane ga naru (2004)
Lyrics by 将/Shou
Music by 虎/Tora
Rearrangement (2019) by 沙我/Saga
Original text translated from Japanese.
Listen on Spotify (Orig. / 2019).
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