Saikai - story (translation)

Called back to consciousness by a faint light,
by the memory of a fleeting dream and the fading remnant of your voice,

the vivid stirring of that far-distant past
keeps reflecting a scene that now I can no longer see:

Ah... clear as though it were but yesterday, I still remember it!
That one glance which touched me more deeply than anyone else ever had...

The joy of what we shared
and that near-miraculous encounter
and even the last traces of what we were together -- all of it, deserted, vanishing away...

From within those vanishing memories,
I yearn to hold you just one more time.
To the verge of pain, I keep crying out your name
until my voice is worn to silence.

"Where is it that people come from, and where do they go?
My precious, gentle one--
you alone are no longer here..."*

I want to hold you in my arms
as you stand there trembling, head downcast.
Because I've realized that what I want
is to protect you, more than anyone else in all this world.

Soon now, very soon, I too will disappear, yet...
even so... you are the one last thing I cannot bear to let go.
Those days when you held me to the verge of pain--
I will never forget...