{"id":318849,"date":"2026-08-03T12:00:24","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T11:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=318849"},"modified":"2026-07-28T07:41:35","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T06:41:35","slug":"there-will-be-times-oh-my-child-when-it-all-seems-hopeless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2026\/08\/there-will-be-times-oh-my-child-when-it-all-seems-hopeless\/","title":{"rendered":"There Will Be Times, Oh My Child, When It All Seems Hopeless"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Feature image via Adobe Stock<\/p><\/div>\n

There will be times,
\noh my child,
\nwhen it all seems hopeless.<\/p>\n

When the trees all have QR codes
\nand the bank boys and balrogs
\nare holding all the cards.<\/p>\n

When your refrigerator tells you
\n\u201cTHE IRANIAN PEOPLE YEARN FOR FREEDOM\u201d
\nand your electric shaver can smell
\nif you\u2019ve been reading Parenti.<\/p>\n

When you\u2019re on a first-name basis
\nwith the police surveillance drones
\nand your colonoscopy screen
\nin the exam room
\nis running ads for Northrop Grumman.<\/p>\n

And it is true,
\noh my child,
\nit is true that the machine is mighty
\nand that its armor is very thick.<\/p>\n

It is true that the bank boys
\nhave long fingers
\nand they are putting marbles
\nin our minds.<\/p>\n

The sky is red,
\nand the moon has a FOR SALE sign,
\nand parts of Palestinians
\nare turning up in our tap water.<\/p>\n

But oh my child, do not be daunted,
\nand oh my child, do not despair.
\nThere are forces within us
\nthe Flock cameras can\u2019t see.
\nThere are depths within us
\nnot even the balrogs can reach.<\/p>\n

Beneath all the doomscroll addiction psychosis,
\nbeneath all the oceans of trauma and toil,
\na creature is stirring
\nand opening its eyes,
\nits eyes full of primordial d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu,
\nits eyes full of Big Bang recursions
\nfull of eyes
\nwatching eyes
\nwatching eyes
\nwatching eyes.<\/p>\n

It looks at you,
\nand you meet its gaze.<\/p>\n

Everything goes still.<\/p>\n

You remember what you are.<\/p>\n

Oh my sweet, darling child,
\nyou see it now.<\/p>\n

You see that This
\ncould never be contained.<\/p>\n

________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Caitlin Johnstone is a rogue journalist, poet, and utopia prepper<\/em>. Contact: <\/em>admin@caitlinjohnstone.com<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original – caitlinjohnstone.com.au<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The sky is red, and the moon has a FOR SALE sign, and parts of Palestinians are turning up in our tap water. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":310933,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[1733,554,401,87,865,352,868],"class_list":["post-318849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry-format","tag-artificial-intelligence-ai","tag-children","tag-environment","tag-gaza","tag-genocide","tag-modernity","tag-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318849"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":318853,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318849\/revisions\/318853"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/310933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}