The protests that erupted in the summer of 2020, which appeared at first as a scattered and eclectic burst of civil resistance, have coagulated behind a single political demand. The slogans that accompany them, “They Are Despair, We Are Hope,” “An Entire Generation Demands a Future,” “Good Night Despair, Good Morning Hope” – identify hope as the main political asset at the center of the fight against the Netanyahu regime, and as its clearest message. The struggle over hope, that culminated in these protests, seems like the obvious response to the feeling of stuckness, paralysis and despair that have overcome the political left and center in Israel in recent years. But can the politics of hope live up to its promise of extracting us from the impasse? And what exactly do we learn from the widespread yearning for hope and the transformation of that emotional stance from a means to advance political goals to a purpose in its own right? The article discusses these questions by turning from the political discourse that strives to arouse hope to songwriting about its absence. Rona Kenan’s album “Orange Time,” which came out in March 2019, documents the political and emotional trap in which the hope question currently ensnares us, and explains why the politics of hope cannot break it open. Using  Kenan’s diagnostic album, the article portrays a life in which both hope and despair are feelings we do not feel, and points to the need to develop other emotional stances towards the future that break through the paralyzing contrast between them.