“Unless they are flooded and overflowing their banks, rivers pretty much keep to themselves, flowing through channels cut into the land since ancient times.  Although many rivers are powerful, even mighty, they can become somewhat helpless in the face of human abuse.  Since earliest times, human beings have thrown waste and garbage into them.  In modern times with large populations and industrialized waste that remains toxic for generations, rivers are at our mercy. And sometimes they cry for help, a cry often heard only by people attuned to the voices of the land, the voices of the animals and the waters.  And when these earth-oriented people stand up and speak, the rivers speak through them.

— Tom Cowan