Poem: Nightmares Roam the Dark sunlight brought the peace the crowding thoughts subsided nightmares roamed the dark paired with a portion of an artwork titled The Valkyries. It was featured as one of the four large-scale central canvases in Conrad Botes’ 2019 solo exhibition, The Goliath Protocol, at Circa Gallery/Everard Read in Johannesburg. The full painting depicts a fallen figure (representing a dead or dying man) floating or falling in a landscape, surrounded by strange, skull-headed, bat-like creatures. The work is an allegory for the Marikana massacre of 2012. Specifically, it alludes to the events at the "second koppie," where striking miners who had fled the initial police gunfire were pursued and killed. Botes subverts the traditional Norse mythology of the Valkyries—who typically carried the souls of brave warriors to Valhalla. In this version, the creatures appear more predatory and macabre, suggesting they are "tormenting" rather than honoring the fallen. The background is composed of large-scale, screen-printed photographs of the actual Marikana landscape taken by Botes, creating an "oppressive" and "claustrophobic" atmosphere. The central figure is covered in his signature "crawling tattoo" style—a myriad of small, cartoonish images representing contaminated ideologies and history. For contemplation only; a low-res copy of the original, unsuitable for commercial use, ©owner Words & image ©ilinkcs (2026/01)
in the cold of the night
when the mind roams
into caves of olden fears
and silent thunder
only sunlight
brings respite
…
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