As Things Are (A Poem in Progress)

I'm cheating this week on 2 levels.  First, this is another poem for my poetry class (that I still need to email to my professor!), although it wasn't intentionally gonna be written for class (or at all, for that matter) - I had had an idea for a pessimistic poem a while ago, and having created my heteronym for class, he seemed like the type to write it all out.  Second, this is unfinished, which is what I'm more sorry for.  I haven't written much poetry on my own lately, and the ideas I've been having require more thought than spitting them out and posting them here immediately afterwards.  This is mostly finished - it's got the bare bones of what I want - but there are things left unanswered that need their own stanza, and I'm not happy with the wording yet.

As for the poem itself, yeah, it's pretty depressing.  The history of its creation is that, a while ago, I thought up the first two lines, because I was interested in the mindset of a person who looked so far ahead so persistently that all he could see was the inevitability of death, kind of like an existential crisis except the person is resigned to the thought.  As I said, my heteronym fits that personality type, and I decided to let him write it.  The 1st line of the 2nd stanza is actually from another idea I had, or rather, a fragment of an idea - during some car trip, I came up with the idea for what would've been a huge poem, with verses upon verses, and that line would've been the basis for one of them.  Unfortunately, that line was the only line I remembered from the whole idea later on, and it seemed appropriate for this piece.


That's enough rambling for now.  Even though this is still in its initial working stages, let me know your thoughts so I can improve it soon!  Thanks for reading, here's to better things next time!  (Don't I always say that?)
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As Things Are
by Max Thurleaf

Knowing the way life goes,
It is as though you were already dead,
And your bones buried deep.

Your mortality hangs off your skin
In the wrinkles that will come to weigh you down,
And they will drag you into the lake
Like so many rocks and dresses,

And though your skin is still smooth and fresh,
With the soft pink glow of your youth,
You walk lightly on your toes, and I gaze,
Looking for the first sign of death
Hanging beneath your eyes.