Beneath the skin, where shadows creep,
Where silent specters nightly weep,
There courses through, with muffled breath,
A harbinger of quiet death.

Oh! How it winds, how it ascends,
Through veins and arteries, it bends—
Invisible, it takes its hold,
More treacherous than tales of old.

No cawing raven warns the door,
No tempest howls upon the shore.
Yet in this stillness, danger dwells,
A curse more grim than midnight bells.

The heart, it pounds—a steady tread,
Yet hears no warning, sees no red.
But lo! This foe, with cunning art,
It crushes slow the fragile heart.

Unseen, unknown, until the day
When life itself is stripped away.
Beware the pressure none can see—
For in its clasp lies misery.

So heed the silence, hear the drum,
For when it calls, too late, you’ll come.
A phantom’s grip, a specter’s chill—
High blood, the silent force to kill.