🎸My Personal Top 10 Mayumi Itsuwa Songs: No. 10 “Koishisa wa Ima” — Memories of Love Lingering in the Clouds and Wind

Read about the history of Mayumi Itsuwa here!

No. 10 is “Koishisa wa Ima” (“Longing Lives On”).

“Koishisa wa Ima” was released on April 1, 1987, as the B-side of the single “Soshite Sayonara” (“And Then, Goodbye”). It was also included on the original album Wind and Roses, released on May 21 of the same year.

The title track, “Soshite Sayonara,” was released as the theme song for a suspense drama broadcast by Kansai TV and Fuji TV. The title track received the main promotional focus, and no separate chart performance or detailed contemporary reception for “Koishisa wa Ima” can be confirmed.

By that time, Mayumi Itsuwa had already established a distinctive musical identity following the major success of “Koibito yo” (“My Lover”). The previous year, she had released “Toki no Nagare ni: Tori ni Nare” and performed the song on NHK’s annual Kohaku Uta Gassen.

“Koishisa wa Ima” does not portray the moment of separation as a dramatic event. Beginning on the morning after a dream, the song entrusts the clouds and the wind with a message: the passion for someone she can no longer see has not disappeared.

Interpretive Translation

Even knowing that I may never see you again, my heart still searches for you as it did back then.
I want to entrust these undying feelings to the clouds crossing the sky and the wind rushing past.
No matter how far apart we are, neither the memory of our love nor this longing will disappear.
Time may continue to pass, but the passion in my heart is still alive.

💡 You might also like: View the original Japanese lyrics (External site)

If the lyrics are available only in Japanese, you can use your browser’s translation feature or an AI translation tool to understand their general meaning.

First, listen to the official recording on YouTube.

Video Credits
🎵 Official Audio
“Koishisa wa Ima” / Mayumi Itsuwa
YouTube Channel: Mayumi Itsuwa - Topic
Provided to YouTube by Sony Music Direct (Japan) Inc.

Two-Line Commentary
A quietly played piano and Mayumi Itsuwa’s warm voice delicately portray the ache of an unforgettable love.
The image of entrusting one’s feelings to the clouds and wind gives this exquisite ballad its mature and poignant beauty.

A Story That Begins on the Morning After a Dream

Birdsong and the Coldness of Being Alone

The song begins on a morning after the protagonist has dreamed of “you.”

Birds are singing by the window, and an ordinary morning has arrived outside. Yet the protagonist does not feel the brightness of a new day. The person she met in her dream is absent from the waking world. That contrast reaches her as the coldness of being alone.

Itsuwa does not explain the protagonist’s loneliness in detail. By placing the sound of birds beside the temperature she feels in her body, the lyrics show that the outside world continues to move while her heart alone is pulled back into the past.

The Dream That Reopened a Closed Memory

The protagonist did not deliberately look back on an old love. The person who appeared while she slept unexpectedly reopened a memory that was usually kept closed.

In the dream, she could face that person as though the distance between them had vanished. By morning, the person had once again become unreachable. That brief change reveals that a powerful feeling remained beneath her outward composure.

Lyrics That Do Not Explain the Separation

The lyrics never reveal why the two people parted. We are not told who chose the separation or where the other person is now.

What we do know is that they once loved each other and that the days in which they cannot meet continue in the present. Because the circumstances are left undefined, listeners can imagine the distance and time between them through the lens of their own experiences.

She Is Not Asking to Rekindle the Relationship

The protagonist does not ask the other person to return. Nor does she seek an answer that would allow the relationship to begin again.

What she wants to convey is that her longing remains alive despite the distance between them. She is not seeking a reply. She is trying to deliver the feeling itself—the emotion that never disappeared.

The Different Roles of the Clouds and the Wind

The Clouds as Messengers of Passion

The protagonist calls out to the clouds drifting across a distant sky. The clouds can travel to places she cannot reach. She entrusts them with her passion and asks them to carry it to the person she once loved.

For that reason, it is not enough to interpret the clouds solely as a symbol of passing time. Their primary role in this song is to serve as messengers capable of crossing the distance between two separated people.

The Urgency Created by the Repetition of “Quickly”

In her appeal to the clouds, the word “quickly” is repeated. She wants the feelings awakened by the dream to reach the other person without delay. Her urgency is concentrated in that brief command.

Yet there is no guarantee that the clouds will reach their destination. Because she cannot confirm where they will go, hope and loneliness coexist within her request.

The Wind as a Force That Awakens Memory

In the second half of the song, the wind replaces the clouds. As the wind begins to stir, nostalgia overflows into tears. An invisible movement has touched a memory that had long remained closed.

If the clouds carry her feelings into the distance, the wind shakes the protagonist from within and draws her concealed emotions to the surface. Although both are elements of nature, their functions do not overlap.

The Appeal Changes from “Quickly” to “Strongly”

The word repeated in her appeal to the wind is not “quickly,” but “strongly.”

In the first half, she asks for her feelings to be delivered swiftly. In the second, she asks that the longing still alive within her be conveyed with greater force. The request shifts from speed to intensity, preventing the second verse from becoming a simple repetition of the first.

Repetition Reveals the Heart of the Song

Past Love and Present Separation

Throughout the lyrics, the person she once loved and the days in which they can no longer meet are repeatedly connected.

The first confirms that a genuine love once existed between them. The second defines the distance of the present. By placing these two realities side by side, the song shows the protagonist holding both a happy memory and an unchangeable reality at the same time.

Why the Chorus Returns to the Same Place

The repeated chorus is not merely another way of stating the same information.

Whether she entrusts her feelings to the clouds or to the wind, the days in which they cannot meet remain unchanged. By returning to that point, the song expresses a cycle of time from which the protagonist cannot escape.

The later passage, however, adds the recognition that her longing remains alive in the present. The song returns to the same place, but the protagonist’s understanding has deepened.

The Weight of “Now” in the Title

The song is not concerned only with how deeply she loved this person in the past. Its true focus is the form that love has taken in the present.

Her longing is not sleeping harmlessly inside a memory. It moves her on the morning after the dream. By placing “now” at the center of the title, the song makes what survived the passing years its principal subject.

Mayumi Itsuwa’s Singing and the Song’s Musical Structure

A Quiet Voice Brings the Scene Closer

Itsuwa does not force the sadness forward from the opening line. She follows the dream, the birdsong, and the coldness by the window in a calm voice, guiding the listener into the protagonist’s morning.

Her lower register has warmth and depth, while the higher passages never exaggerate the sorrow. She preserves the meaning of the words and transfers what lies inside the protagonist’s heart directly into her voice.

Greater Vocal Force in the Calls to Nature

When she calls out to the clouds and the wind, the strength of her voice clearly increases. Yet she does not express passion through volume alone.

By sharpening the contours of the words, she marks the moment when feelings held inside begin to move outward. Because this follows the quiet morning scene, the protagonist’s passion becomes all the more vivid.

Music That Moves from Soliloquy to Calling Out

The arrangement begins around a gentle piano and gradually expands in response to the movement of the lyrics. The accompaniment does not dictate the emotion in advance; it keeps the protagonist’s words at the center.

The first half reflects the loneliness of waking from the dream. When she begins calling to the clouds and the wind, the music also opens outward. Rather than relying on an abrupt transformation, the song gradually changes the force of its language and increases its emotional density toward the end.

Another Love Song Born in the Late 1980s

A Different Sense of Time from “Koibito yo”

In “Koibito yo,” the pain of losing a loved one approaches with the imagery of a cold season. The shock of the loss itself stands at the center of the song.

“Koishisa wa Ima” portrays what comes afterward. The protagonist has continued with her daily life, but the dream and the wind make her aware of the passion still held deep inside. The song is not about the separation itself, but about the life that continues while carrying it.

An Intimate Scene Unlike Her Signature Songs

In “Revival,” the desire to bring a past love back to life comes to the foreground. In “Kokoro no Tomo” (“Friend of the Heart”), the spiritual bond with a distant person expands into a much larger world.

“Koishisa wa Ima,” by contrast, never leaves the intimate setting of one woman’s morning. She dreams, awakens, and speaks to the clouds and wind. Through that small sequence of events alone, the song portrays the love that remains within her life.

A Side of Her Preserved in a B-Side

By 1987, Mayumi Itsuwa was already an accomplished artist with many achievements behind her. In this song, the easily recognizable drama often expected of a major hit gives way to writing that draws an inner movement from an ordinary moment.

Because the song was not the featured title track, it allows us to hear a more delicate side of Itsuwa’s expression—one that her best-known songs alone cannot fully reveal.

How the Meaning of “Days Apart” Changes with Age

From a Song of Distance to a Song of Time

When heard at a younger age, the song may sound like an attempt to send feelings to a distant lover. The appeals to the clouds and wind naturally draw attention toward the possibility of reunion and the future of the relationship.

As we grow older, the meaning of “days apart” becomes broader. It can bring to mind not only someone who moved far away, but also someone from whom we became estranged or someone we can never meet again.

What matters then is no longer whether a reunion is possible, but what the time spent with that person has left within us today.

Why I Chose It as No. 10

A Gateway to the Full Range of Mayumi Itsuwa

Any personal Top 10 of Mayumi Itsuwa must include signature songs such as “Koibito yo,” “Revival,” and “Kokoro no Tomo.” Yet famous songs alone can obscure her gift as a writer who draws profound inner movement from ordinary moments.

Nothing outwardly dramatic happens in “Koishisa wa Ima.” It begins with a single dream, moves through appeals to the clouds and wind, and finally arrives at the “now” contained in its title.

The song masterfully connects past and present, distance and memory, a quiet morning and an urgent call within a limited number of scenes. Because it introduces a side of Mayumi Itsuwa that cannot be measured by fame alone, I chose it as No. 10.

In Closing

“Koishisa wa Ima” is not a song about finding a way to reclaim a past love.

She calls to the clouds to move “quickly” and to the wind to carry her feelings “strongly.” Through those two words, the movement of her passion toward someone she cannot see takes form.

Itsuwa connects the coldness of the morning after a dream with the desire to send a message across a great distance, using only the familiar scenery of everyday life.

To me, this is not a song that decorates an old romance. It is a song that looks directly at what remains within a person after many years, without denying its existence.

A small story that begins with one solitary morning carries an emotion capable of crossing many years. That depth is why I began my Mayumi Itsuwa Top 10 with “Koishisa wa Ima.”