Je suis un étranger [English translation]

They dreamed about sweet France1,

the children of exile.

Asylum policies send them

back by charter flights.

Isolated people here

might show some solidarity.

You wear wristwatchs

Me, I snatch them

Valorous financial king

sporting a cynical smile,

we build the walls,

you build the future

in locked-in cities ,

fear in the subways

under the song of slaves

as the bird flies away

I am a stranger,

the storm is my country.

I have no currency,

the road is my friend.

We get the civilization

You get the Calais camps2

We get our disenchantment

You get the concrete walls

We and our exhausted cultures

You become a lowly city worker

We sure get the best share

You get the slum hellholes

We the collaborating3

with babylons of money

We the prostituting

You the eye of the spring

We the robbers of lands

You son of tyrany

of our oil fields

You drinking rainwater

I am a stranger,

the storm is my country.

I have no currency,

the road is my friend.

I am a stranger,

and so goes my path.

I have burned the papers4

I have shared my wine

To pick up the trash

you work in the early hours.

We stare at the sky

You bend your body

Your hope locked in a cave

you pour sweat

under the song of slaves

for the benefit of the heartless

Every one an illegal alien

Every one without a homeland

Every one the son of a stranger

Every one the son of the wildfire

Sweet France, tell me why

I see nothing but ignorance

outrageous fascisms

in the country of our childhoods5?

We are all strangers,

The Earth is our country.

We have no currency,

the road is our friend.

We are all strangers,

the storm is our path.

You shall burn your papers,

you shall share your wine.

1. reference to the song "Douce France" from Charles Trénet, depicting an idealized country of wine and roses2. reference to Sangatte refugee camp in the late 90's. Sangatte is located near Calais, at the French end of the Channel tunnel3. allusion to French collaboration with Nazi Germany during WWII. "collaborant" is an unusual way of saying things, as if collaboration was defining the person4. immigration documents5. The first line of "Douce France" says "Sweet France, the country of my childhood"