This Rock by Robert Morgan

herbal fogs. There was a dozen different vapors in the air.
    Along with the smells there was grasshoppers and beetles boiling up where I swept the blade. There was dust and bits of thistle, seeds and ripped leaves flying where the weed stalks leaned backward and fell. The air was filled with moths that had been sleeping under the leaves, little white and lavender butterflies stirred up by the mowing. Spiderwebs between stalks got tore and spiders jumped out of my way or scurried along the ground between cut stalks. There was spiders along every inch of ground under the weeds, big spiders and little, black spiders and yellow spiders, garden spiders and furry spiders. There was spiders that looked like black pearls. Some resembled boats running on their oars.
    Hoppers and leaf mites shook loose from the disturbed weeds and boiled up like dust. Every stalk seemed to have a meal of white and yellow lice on it if you looked close. I swept the blade close to the ground, moving ahead in half circles with every sweep. I wanted the ground to look like it had been mowed with a razor.
    The handles jolted almost out of my hands and the blade rung like a sword. I’d hit a rock the size of a grapefruit and seen the white cut the blade made on the weathered rock. Weeds had mashed green stains on the rock. It was a rock I’d mowed into before. I leaned over and picked up the rock and throwed it against the side of the hogpen. The pig snorted and lunged from one side of the pen to the other.
    I will not be stopped, I said to myself. I will not be stopped frombuilding something grand. I will not be stopped from serving the Lord in my own way. Where there is not a way I will make a way. I will not be trapped on Green River. A life without a mission has no meaning. I was drunk with sweat, and I was inspired by my labor.
    I raised the blade and inspected the edge in the sunlight. The metal was stained green, and leaves and pieces of stalks stuck to the wet steel. All the brightness was covered with weed juice. There was a nick in the edge where the rock had bit a gap in the sharpness. I took the whetrock and begun to sharpen the blade all over again. I couldn’t whet out the nick, but I could sharpen around it. The rock had damaged a perfect blade. A few more nicks like that and the blade would be useless. The rock had stood in my way like Moody stood in my way and like my own foolishness stood in my way. The lack of money stood in the way of my going away from Green River. I sharpened the blade like I was punishing steel. The steel felt soft and fat under the grained stone. I rasped the sides until the blade sparkled. I sharpened the nick until it was thin as a razor.
    My fury made the sunlight brighter and the weeds more vivid. I could see every weed stalk; every leaf and stick of trash stood out. I seen every separate fly over the hogpen and the silvery grain of the weathered boards. I seen the chalky white butterflies whispering away and grasshoppers clicking and flinging theirselves from weed to weed like giant fleas. My anger made the air shine, and I felt the heat coming up from the weeds and moist ground. The steams and vapors from the ground rose into my face. The weeds had molten gold in their veins that burned my skin.
    The big weeds was like everything else that stood in my way. I launched into the stalks, swinging harder and faster. I meant to quell the whole bank of weeds. I meant to quell the whole field. The weeds rose up at me and mocked me and resisted me. The weeds was stampeding into their lushness. The weeds rose in waves higher and higher, about to wash over and bury me in a great flood that would drown every path and clearing, every field and road. Weeds tossed out arms and vines of morning glories caught on bushes and trees. Briars raked everything that passed, catching rabbit fur and fox fur. Big canes of blackberry briars shot up like fountains, crawling with chiggers, and swirled around in bins, washing away