The Secret is Dying

[71degrees]

You wonder what it’s like
to be different, to be piled
like rock next to cold water,
so afraid you could tip
at the slightest tremormost often the first line is the hook...not here. This is a worthy opening stanza. There is an easy inconsistency in the meter which makes for a conversational intonation...though I hear semi colon I do not see one. Maybe it is that "so " which I so dislike...sorry, I meant dislike. Spot the difference.

what it is like to be laid naked Why omit punctuation? Look, if you think it helps...fine. I don't. See? It. Punctuate to clarity...why ever not?
on a shore on a night so cold
your teeth rattle, your heart
so terrified it may stop See. That's what happens EVERY time. "YOU are so terrified that your heart may stop" is not the same as "You are so terrified. Your heart may stop" or "your heart so terrified(??)
it may stop". Which is it? Punctuation can clarify.
This thought is not new; it has been
a secret for thousands of years:
bedrock, granite; not shale,
not limestone Not sure this hangs right. If something is hidden in the mist of aeons
, unknown, then is discovered, is it new?
you are so briefly human,
aren’t you? Then suddenly, The "aren't you" disassociates the narrator from the piece. This does not seem intentional.
you are not, and over time,
you become so much hardness,
able to last forever, like the secret

A whole lot to like in this but it needs tweeking. There is, in the final stanza, an enigma that needs a solution or an understanding...I am unhappy to be left unknowing. Punctuation is an issue.
Best.
tectak.

Actually, if I left you unhappy, I accomplished my mood, but perhaps it's for the wrong reasons. I do agree w/some of your punctuation comments. Thank you. Adverbs are a bane of mine. I OFTEN write them and I do EVEN realize I'm doing it. "So" is one of them. I like semi-colons in short poems b/c most thoughts are / should connect. I detest periods. "Tweaking" is a good word. I shall.