Some Things Never Change

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 on 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...

Book IV, lines 169-186, Rolfe Humphries translation of
Virgil's Aeneid
Submitted by Marion Wheeler