Marcette, Swamp Hag's "Mortality" never settles on an answer. Instead, the speaker asks question after question, trying out different pictures of what death might be. It could be a cold, barren country with no way out, or a burning serpent coiled around the body under a summer sun. It could be poison, a fang or a switchblade that cuts into flesh and mind. It could be a plague that ruins body and legacy alike, leaving someone a "syphilitic leper."
The last image is the quietest and maybe the most unsettling. Death might be nothing dramatic at all, just a body that breaks or winds down like a pocket watch, whether smashed by a hammer or left to unravel on its own. The speaker sounds anxious and fascinated, circling the subject rather than facing it. The mood is dark and uneasy, and the violent, grotesque images give way to a bleak sense of simple stopping.