The heaven Darkens, and thunder rolls, and rain and hail Come down in torrents. The hunt is all for shelter, Trojans and Tyrians and Ascanius dashing Wherever they can; the streams pour down the mountains. To the same cave go Dido and Aeneas, Where Juno, as a bridesmaid, gives the signal, And mountain nymphs wail high their incantations, First day of death, first cause of evil. Dido Is unconcerned with fame, with reputation, With how it seems to others. This is marriage For her, not hole-and-corner guilt; she covers Her folly with this name. Rumor goes flying At once, through all the Libyan cities, Rumor Than whom no other evil was ever swifter. She thrives on motion and her own momentum; Tiny at first in fear, she swells, colossal In no time, walks on earth, but her head is hidden Among the clouds. Her mother, Earth, was angry, Once, at the gods, and out of spite produced her, The Titans’ youngest sister, swift of foot, Deadly of wing, a huge and terrible monster, With an eye below each feather in her body, A tongue, a mouth, for every eye, and ears Double that number; in the night she flies Above the earth, below the sky, in shadow Noisy and shrill; her eyes are never closed In slumber; and by day she perches, watching From tower or battlement, frightening great cities. She heralds truth, and clings to lies and falsehood, It is all the same to her. And now she was going Happy about her business, filling people With truth and lies: Aeneas, Trojan-born, Has come, she says, and Dido, lovely woman, Sees fit to mate with him, one way or another, And now the couple wanton out the winter, Heedless of ruling, prisoners of passion. They were dirty stories, but the goddess gave them To the common ear, then went to King Iarbas With words that fired the fuel of his anger.