I do not know much about gods; but I think the river
Is a strong brown god - sullen, untamed and intractable,
Patient to some degree, at first recognised as a frontier:
Useful, untrustworthy, as a conveyor of commerce;
Then only a problem confronting the builder of bridges.
The problem once solved, the brown god is almost forgotten
By the dwellers in the cities - ever, however implacable,
Keeping his seasons and rages, destroyer, reminder
Of what men choose to forget. Unhonoured, unapropriated
By worshipers of the machine, but waiting, watching and
waiting.
His rhythm was present in the nursery bedroom,
In the rank ailanthus of the April dooryard,
In the smell of grapes on the autumn table,
And the evening circle in the winter gaslight.

- T.S.Elliot
from The Four Quartets : The Dry Salvages