A Supermarket In California Poem by Allen Ginsberg

I too was confused by the meaning of the poem. I was thinking it was just a funny, kind of silly remembrance of Whitman, fooling around a bit with simple grocery store items. Then I read the bio of Frederico Garcia Lorca (a man mentioned in the poem) and an entirely new meaning became blindingly obvious. Lorca, was really devastated about failed homosexual relationships. His two major love interests, one interestingly enough was Salvador Dali, went on to have marriages with women. This is a poem, asking the question of, What does America hold for me the homosexual? The answer is a sad: 'we'll both be lonely.' I won't quote continued lines from the poem, but if you want to feel seem empathy for Ginsberg, Wikipedia Lorca and then reread the poem and focus and the words that are addressing a sense of disenfranchisement from the empty promises America was making, viewed in the context of post World War II feelings that were surfacing and no doubt helping to form the Beat Generation.

There seems to be confusion about the correct lines of this poem.Like many beat poets, Ginsberg worked a lot with the line placement. Ginsberg plays with enjambment and endstops as a matter of humour in this poem. As I know it it should be: What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for I walked down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache self-conscious looking at the full moon. In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon fruit supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations! What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at night! Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes! -and you, Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons? I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking among the meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery boys. I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the pork chops? What price bananas? Are you my Angel? I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans following you, and followed in my imagination by the store detective. We strode down the open corridors together in our solitary fancy tasting artichokes, possessing every frozen delicacy, and never passing the cashier. Where are we going, Walt Whitman? The doors close in an hour. Which way does your beard point tonight? (I touch your book and dream of our odyssey in the supermarket and feel absurd.) Will we walk all night through solitary streets? The trees add shade to shade, lights out in the houses, we'll both be lonely. Will we stroll dreaming of the lost America of love past blue automobiles in driveways, home to our silent cottage? Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher, what America did you have when Charon quit poling his ferry and you got out on a smoking bank and stood watching the boat disappear on the black waters of Lethe?

somewhere west of Mandalay, ginsberg is the wilderness inside yellow rapeseed flowers, a cry of dust from the soul town

James: Interesting observation. I have not read Garcia Lorca's bio, but had read about his interest in Harlem and the experience of blacks in America and interpreted the reference to Garcia Lorca as a humorous reference from one transgressive poet (Ginsberg thinks that store security is following him) to another.

Very Good! Enchanting! !

A vivid depiction of the many intricacies of life. Great imagery.

Congratulations being chosen as The Modern Poem Of The Day!

I cite Google: The first state to allow same- marriage was Massachusetts, which granted the right in 2004.Now more States in the US allows homosexual marriages. In Ginsberg time it was prohibited

2) A very thought-provoking poem, but easiest guessed IF you know the names mentioned here are all homosexual persons. A saddest Song told here 5 Stars full on Top!

Not just A Supermarket in California, but in this poem, in the lines and words hide tragedy and loneliness amongst the mentioned names, and also in the poet's mind, but outed as a protest dialogue in the Supermarket.