In a village in northwestern Italy, three Americans enter off a stone-knuckled street into the sterile light of the local milk dispensary (just a single mopped-clean room and no people: an aluminum refrigeration unit, a case laden with cheeses on display) to deposit a Euro into the humming milk machine, to fill their dirty plastic liter container—frothing, the cream already separating—before taking turns drinking straight from the bottle, white rivers unfurling from the edges of their mouths, purling through their beards or across stubbled cheeks and chin, heads thrown back and eyes closed, as if this were the best the world would ever offer to touch their needful lips.

Profile: Douglas W. Milliken