Ginsberg's Supermarket in California was interesting. It seemed like a pros poem. The supermarket items were used to represent many aspects of poetry and poets. In my opinion, talking about the change in poetry. The old and the new ways of poets and the originality. It is ironic because in a way, he is making fun of Walt Whitman's poetry, however, the poem itself looks like something Walt Whitman wrote. This poem is definitely something new as it is a poem about poetry and poets. In my opinion, it brings originality to a whole new level.
This supermarket in California is supposed to be the literary world. Everyone there is looking for something new, something that will make them original. Those people who are the fruits and the produce are merely the rest of the world, and those who are shopping are there to use them for inspiration. "Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes!--" Ginsberg is painting us a picture of people being merely the produce of writers and poets. Walt Whitman is there to represent the old ways, the old styles of writing and poetry. He is the old, ragged man in the supermarket who is picky and, frankly, crazy. "Where are we going, Walt Whitman? The doors close in an hour. Which way does your beard point tonight?" Ginsberg is trying to draw inspiration from Walt Whitman, but at the same time is showing us that Walt Whitman is down and out. He has nothing to offer but his past.
Ginsberg is trying to say, in this poem, that the world is merely used up by poets and writers. And, by the introduction of Walt whitman, he is saying that the old ways are no longer working.