"A Man Called Milford"

Milford lifted the cup of sweet fragrant tea again, and drank, and then he drank again, and once more, and the cup was now empty. 

He sighed, his twelve-thousandth-and-twenty-ninth sigh since awakening from a troubled nightmarish sleep the previous morning into a troubled and nightmarish long day and seemingly endless night. 

"Walter," said Miss Blackbourne, apparently in response to something Mr. Whitman had said, something Milford hadn't caught because he had a bad habit of not listening to people, "don't you ever get tired of pontificating?"

"Ouch!" cried Walt.

"Burn!" said the Negro man called Jelly Roll. "Burn, baby, burn!"

Milford wondered if he should pour himself another cup of tea from the blue and white teapot. 

"Ah, dear Margaret," said Mr. Whitman, "it is an occupational hazard of the poetic sage, this urge to spout wisdom and platitudes."

"Spout bullshit you mean," said Miss Blackbourne.

"Heh heh," said Mr. Whitman, lifting his tankard to his wet-whiskered lips.

"Look at Jelly Roll there," said Miss Blackbourne, "you don't see him going on with all this godhead and brotherhood of man baloney."

"Thank you, ma'am," said Jelly Roll. "Murder ballads and cat house cantos are more my style."

"That's because you're not full of crap like Walt," said Miss Blackbourne. "I mean, don't get me wrong, Walter, you're a great poet and all that, but Jesus Christ, man, give the fucking pomposity a rest now and then."

"I shall try, dear Margaret," said Mr. Whitman, tilting his great hairy head under that slouch hat of his. "It's hard for me, but it's just that I am so overflowing with what the Greeks called agape, that is to say brotherly love, although I suppose there is something to be said for sisterly love as well –"

"Can it," she said. "Look at Milford there, he knows how to keep his trap shut."

"You mean Mulgrew?" said Mr. Whitman.

"I thought it was Milford," said Miss Blackbourne.

"I think it's Milltowne," said Jelly Roll.

"What's your name, pal?" said Miss Blackbourne, addressing Milford.

"What?" said Milford. He was still wondering if he should pour himself some more tea. 

"I asked you what your name is," said Miss Blackbourne.

Milford wanted more tea, but on the other hand he knew that if he kept on drinking the delicious and restorative tea he would have to go to the men's room again, and he was afraid of going back to that men's room, he was afraid of going to any men's room ever again.

"Milford?" said Miss Blackbourne.

"Yes?" Milford managed to say.

"I asked you a question."

"What was it?"

"Miss Margaret wants to know what your name is, man," said Jelly Roll.

"It's Mulvaney, right?" said Mr. Whitman. "Tell her, Mahoney."

"It's not Mulvaney," said Miss Blackbourne. "Nor Mahoney. Milford, if that really is your name, tell us what your name is."

"My name?"

"Yes," said Miss Blackbourne. "It's a simple question. What's your name?"

"I'm pretty sure it's Moxton," said Mr. Whitman. "Or Moxley."

"What's your name, man?" said Jelly Roll.

Suddenly Milford realized that he couldn't remember his name. What was his name? 

"Um," he said.

"Uh-oh," said Jelly Roll. "I seen this before."

"Um, uh," elaborated Milford.

"It's Mulgrave, right?" said Mr. Whitman.

"It's not God damned Mulgrave, Walt," said Miss Blackbourne. "Milford, didn't you tell me your name was Milford?"

"I, uh," said Milford.

"He's too high," said Jelly Roll. "Can't remember his own name. Too much muggles and hash, too many magic mushrooms, too much jimson weed and John the Conqueroo and ayahuasca and laudanum, and probably too much good old-fashioned lush, and now it looks like your special tea just sent him right over the edge. What'd you put in that tea anyway, Miss Margaret?"

"It's just plain ordinary Assam tea," she said. "I would never dose someone I'd just met."

(Milford suddenly remembered that he had also drunk some sarsaparilla supposedly spiked with ambrosia, the mystical viaticum of the gods, but it seemed too much effort to share this memory with his companions.)

Miss Blackbourne reached across the table and touched Milford's hand with the fingers of her hand, the nails of which were long and sharp and painted the color of fresh glistening blood. 

"Darling, just tell us your name."

"His name is Murgatroyd I think," said Mr. Whitman.

"Still thy tongue, Walt," said Miss Blackbourne, and now she touched Milford's cheek, which had grown even more pallid than usual. "What's your name, buddy?"

"My name is," said Milford, but then he stopped. 

He stood up, almost knocking his chair over, but Jelly Roll grabbed it.

"Hey, where you going, McGraw?" said Mr. Whitman.

"Sit down, my good man," said Miss Blackbourne. "We only want to know what your name is."

"It starts with an M, I'm pretty sure of that," said Jelly Roll. "What about Mulligan?"

Milford reached under his peacoat and into the side pocket of his dungarees, brought out his old Boy Scout wallet, and opened it up.

"Now what are you doing?" said Miss Blackbourne. 

Milford looked into the wallet's compartment where he kept a few cards and scraps of paper, ideas for poems, drafts of suicide notes and such, and there was his library card. He took it out and looked at it.

"'Marion Milford,'" he read, aloud.

"See, I told you guys," said Miss Blackbourne. "Marion Milford, but he goes by Milford because Marion is a girl's name."

Milford sat down again.

"Can I see that card?" said Mr. Whitman.

Milford handed him the library card, and Mr. Whitman took a pair of wire-rimmed glasses from inside his workman's jacket and put them on, then looked at the card.

"Yes, it does say 'Marion Milford'," he said. He looked at Milford over the rims of his glasses. "Is this your library card?"

"Um," said Milford.

"I mean," said Mr. Whitman, "is it your card and not someone else's, or a forgery perhaps?"

"I, I –" said Milford.

"Of course it's the boy's card," said Miss Blackbourne. "Why else would he have it in his wallet?"

"That's what I'm trying to find out, Margaret," said Mr. Whitman. "Take your time, Mulliford. All we want to know is if this is actually and in truth your own and proper library card."

"Yes," said Milford, after only a brief pause. "I think so."

"You think so."

"Yes. Unless –"

"Unless what?"

"Unless I dreamt that it's my library card. Unless my whole life has been a dream. Unless I'm in someone else's dream. Unless I'm dreaming what's happening now."

"Wow," said Jelly Roll. "That's some heavy ass shit right there."

"It's his fucking library card, Walt," said Miss Blackbourne, "now give it back to him before the poor boy loses whatever of his mind he has left."

Mr. Whitman looked at the card one more time then proffered it across the table to Milford, who took it and put it back in his wallet. Then he stood up again, almost knocking his chair over again (Jelly Roll grabbing it again), and he put the wallet back into the side pocket of his jeans, and sat down, again.

"Milford," said Mr. Whitman, and he took off his glasses.

"I told you, Walt," said Miss Blackbourne.

"My man Milford," said Jelly Roll. "He knows his own name."

"I guess he does, Jelly Roll," said Mr. Whitman. "I'll warrant he does." He folded up his glasses and put them away. "Don't you, Mugford?"

"Walter!" said Miss Blackbourne.

"Aw, I'm just fucking with the kid, Margaret," said Mr. Whitman. "Come on, let's finish our drinks and blow this popsicle stand."

"I'm down with that," said Miss Blackbourne. "Do you want to go somewhere else, Milford?"

"Yes," said Milford, because he always wanted to be somewhere else, except when he was in bed

"Do you want another cup of tea first?"

"No," he said, and he felt as if he were emerging from a thick fog, out of a dark cobbled alleyway, into a street where there were lights and motors and people and the sounds of laughter and music, a living and sparkling city of night. "Let's just go."

"Right, let's roll," said Jelly Roll. "And I know just the place to go."

And soon enough our four friends got up from the table and left.

And where to? 

To another bar, of course.

{Please go here to read the unexpurgated "adult comix" version in A Flophouse Is Not a Home, profusely illustrated and with additional dialogue by the illustrious rhoda penmarq…}