The 155th Sonnet

Shakespeare's *Macbeth* was in my syllabus when I was in secondary school. But *Macbeth* was just an appetiser, for I went on to get the complete works of his. It was as I was reading his sonnets that I tried to mimic his 14-line poems-and the rest is history. I did not simply read Shakespeare; I encountered him.

In my "mimicking" of his sonnets, I learnt that a word could be stretched from its primary meaning to other "shades" of meaning. Poetry to me is like a pilgrimage, a path of mystery, a ritual that can transport the poet from where he is to where the subject of his writing is, where he achieves a lived experience.

I deliberately chose a rhyming scheme of **AABB CDCD EEFF GG**, with which I wish to import an African voice into the sacred art of sonnet writing.

✨ *OnukaoguOkechi83 is a winner of the Shortys 2025.

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