When it was reprinted in a d'Arcy collection, he wrote a preface explaining the confusion of the two titles: My only excuse for offering this little book is the fact that my friends want to get a few stories out of my scrap book—so here they are.
In the 1941 film Louisiana Purchase, Bob Hope conducts a Senate filibuster which ends with his reading the entire poem while drawing a picture on the floor.
The title is mentioned in the lyrics of the Paul Francis Webster's song "It's Harry I'm Planning to Marry" (from the 1953 Warner Bros. musical Calamity Jane), despite the fact that it is set in Deadwood, 1876, which actually predates the poem by some 11 years.
The poem is specifically referenced in the last verse of "The Mount Holyoke Drinking Song": This version of the poem was also performed by the vocal group The Blazers on their album Drinking Songs Sung Under the Table released by ABC/Paramount in 1959[4] In the 1970 rock tour film Mad Dogs & Englishmen, starring Joe Cocker and Leon Russell, the band, family, friends, and crew have a large picnic in a field in or near Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Road manager Sherman "Smitty" Jones recites the last several verses of "The Face Upon the Barroom Floor" from memory for the surprised picnickers (those shown on camera including Carl Radle, Bobby Keys, and Joe Cocker), without telling them what it is.
"[5] On p. 254 Hal Incandenza describes a similar dream/nightmare he had during the aftermath of their father James (Himself's) death, while on the phone with his brother Orin on November 5 - Year Of The Depend Adult Undergarment.
--- and then you're in serious trouble, very serious trouble, and you know it, finally, deadly, serious trouble, because this Substance you thought was your one true friend, that you gave up all for, gladly, that for so long gave you relief from the pain of the Losses your love of that relief caused, your mother and lover and god and compadre, has finally removed its smily-face mask to reveal centerless eyes and a ravening maw, and canines down to here, it's the Face In The Floor, the grinning root-white face of your worst nightmares, and the face is your own face in the mirror, now, it's you, the Substance has devoured or replaced and become you, and the puke-, drool-and Substance-crusted T-shirt you've both worn for weeks now gets torn off and you stand there looking and in the root-white chest where your heart (given away to It) should be beating, in its exposed chest's center and center-less eyes is just a lightless hole, more teeth, and a beckoning taloned hand dangling something irresistible, and now you see you've been had, screwed royal, stripped and fucked and tossed to the side like some stuffed toy to lie for all time in the posture you land in.