Cafe au lait & pain au chocolate on the boulevard de Jean Jeaures

consumerist pleasures of the everyday

over & over again

in your face

behind the facade you are welcomed

into the underground

the come together squats of migrational desperation

nationality has no affect here

as you offer the only solidarity you can give

welcomed through the front door of la Cailette

as your own home away from home

the conversations shared over scarce cigarettes

on the edge of it all

the margins of their society

whipped, dried, rotten, shredded normality

on the edge of it all

clinging on to daily business

in the face of it all

it's not the ugly port of Calais alone

it's all of it mashed together

and put into one blind racist pot

it's all of the bloody Dublins

it's all the ports in Greece & Italy

it's the scarcity of hospitality

it's the unbearable normality

in your face

in your face

if you only look at it

if you only

go to the Jungle & shake hands

& learn some Pashdu

& listen

& cry secretly

& be ashamed

Broken and tired

it's not an offence to go where you want

in this fucked up world we are all offered

where we are all violently divided by a fine line

of privilege & random incidents

one of you is "trying"' every second night for England

has lost his family

has hope & dreams

In between these moments of despair there are cracks & gaps of a post border utopia

in our interactions and conversations

then you cry again & again

as fascist bleach burns on Syrian heads

cry I tell you for there is no shame

in feeling human towards each other

when the cards are dealt wrong

when all seems at its bitter end

we will find it's a lie that we will tear each other apart

because together as one

we came in Calais.

Written in solidarity with the displaced and undocumented by Alicia and Jimmy.