The Plain of Donnerdale

The old inventive Poets, had they seen,
Or rather felt, the entrancement that detains
Thy waters, Duddon! ’mid these flow’ry plains,
The still repose, the liquid lapse serene,
Transferr’d to bowers imperishably green,
Had beautified Elysium! But these chains
Will soon be broken;—a rough course remains,
Rough as the past; where Thou, of placid mien,
Innocuous as a firstling of a flock,
And countenanced like a soft cerulean sky,
Shalt change thy temper; and, with many a shock
Given and received in mutual jeopardy,
Dance like a Bacchanal from rock to rock,
Tossing her frantic thyrsus wide and high!