There Diomedes aimed and stabbed, he gouged him down
his glistening flesh and wrenched the spear back out
the brazen god of war let loose a shriek, roaring,
thundering loud as nine, ten thousand combat soldiers
shriek with Ares’ fury when massive armies clash.
A shudder swept all ranks, Trojans and Argives both,
terror-struck by the shriek the god let loose,
Ares whose lust for slaughter never dies.
But now,
wild as a black cyclone twisting out of a cloudbank,
building up from the day’s heat, blasts and towers –
so brazen Ares looked to Tydeus’ son Diomedes.
Soaring up with the clouds to the broad sweeping sky.
– Homer
The Iliad, Book 5, lines 990-1001. God of war Ares retreats to Mount Olympus from the battlefield after being wounded by Diomedes, who drives a spear into his belly. An epic simile describes his shriek as being like that of ten thousand soldiers in war. Another extended simile tells us that he ascended to Olympus like a dark cyclone twisting out of a cloudbank.