The Invisible Man’s Herbarium

Mankebe Seakgoe

Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2025

Nobody sees what I can see,

For back of my eyes there is only me.

And nobody knows how my thoughts begin,

For there’s only myself inside my skin.
- Margaret Hillert

Hear… 

I was lost, looking for my face. After such a long life of not seeing it I gave up. I needed to not be seen. I tried to hide but You were everywhere. So I returned to nowhere, the place where I was no one.

Here…

I asked the mountains what the secret was, the secret of the earth and the mountain laughed. I sat under a tree and wept in defeat and then God laughed. A twinkling star kneels to the earth, death becomes her. Writing is not a colourful process.

Where are you? Who are you? Oh so many questions. Your spirit, a whisper from the wind. 

Presence, a gift from the dirt.

Sapovnela…

The invisible man…

It feels strange to admit but I fear I’m terrified of myself, of being confronted by I am. So I’ve been digging and offering fragments to You. Dwelling on the fact that maybe there is nothing there, Here. Almost nothing yet everything...the invisible man.

Am I the invisible man? Who are you? Where are you? 

Who are you when you don’t know where you are?

The invisible man? Here?

Hear the invisible man’s herbarium.