As someone with an educational background in linguistics/translation, and who identifies as an artist (in the musical/lyrical sense), I'm gonna lay it down for you right now: if you try to translate something in a "word for word"/"literal" sense, you *will* destroy the art.

There's a certain...type of person who argues that being interpretive (read: following any reasonable standard set by centuries of debate on translation theory) is desecration to the art, because somehow daring to touch the sanctity of the original words is disrespect

But in actuality I guarantee that you are ruining it by adhering to language structure and not the sentiment, which is what the art was going for in the first place.

Surprise, translation is actually an art form on its own. I don't even mean this poetically, it *literally* is.

The only respect you've paid is to the structure of the original language. You completely disregarded the author's feelings and intent in the process. I can hardly call that respect.

And I can call it even less respect if you use that as an excuse to be condescending about it.