A Supermarket in California

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1956

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

“A Supermarket in California” is a prose poem composed of 12 lines. The lines are written in free verse without a formal adherence to meter. However, there is clear attention paid to the natural rhythms of human speech. The poem’s rhythm comes from its use of strophes, which are grouped lines that in turn affect a sense of pacing and add a poetic flair to Ginsberg’s prose. Ginsberg, being a Beat poet, also uses runs of words that, at moments, are long-winded and difficult to read through, such as, “I walked down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache self-conscious looking at the full moon” (Line 1). These sentences effectively convey a stream-of-consciousness style often associated with the Beat school of poetry and larger literary conventions of that movement.

Strophes

Ginsberg’s most famous poem, “Howl,” is a prime example of a poem written in strophes. “A Supermarket in California” also utilizes the device. A strophe is a grouping of words, or lines, written in free verse that, while not stanzas, effectively act as stanzas by grouping together thoughts and phrases that otherwise form distinct non-isomorphic units. Use of the strophe can be traced back to ancient times, often appearing in Greek tragedy at the beginning of an ode and typically followed by an antistrophe (which answers the strophe) and epode (which follows the antistrophe and completes the section). Additionally, the King James Version of the Bible is one classic example of a text written in strophes as are many political speeches.

While the strophe as a device finds its origins in traditional literature, many contemporary poets use the form more loosely than, say, an ode appearing at the beginning of a Greek tragedy. Strophe, in a more contemporary sense, can simply refer to the turns within a poem written in prose as opposed to verse, where the term “stanza” would more aptly apply.

Ode

An ode is a form of poetry wherein the poem has a distinctly stated addressee. In the case of “A Supermarket in California,” Whitman is that addressee. Odes are commonly used to celebrate another person, and can vary greatly in form though are typically considered to be a type of lyric poetry, often short in length.

Structurally, odes contain three key elements: the strophe, the antistrophe, and the epode. In “A Supermarket in California,” all three of these elements can be found. Ginsberg’s poem is divided into three distinct sections. The opening, composed of standard strophes, the middle of the poem, also written in strophes that serve to complicate the ideas presented in the opening lines, and the ending of the poem, which deviates from the tone and pacing of the earlier strophes and summarizes the primary conceit of the poem.

Odes, while a traditional form of poetry, can range from traditional and old-fashioned sounding poems to more contemporary poems, such Ginsberg’s. Ode might be used also as an umbrella term applied to any poem addressed to a specific person, place, or thing.

Apostrophe

The narrator of “A Supermarket in California” directly addresses Walt Whitman, seeks counsel from Whitman, and later sees Whitman in the supermarket. This type of direct address is known as an apostrophe—it’s different than the punctuation mark of the same name. This literary device appears throughout the poem; it’s use highlights Ginsberg’s loneliness by showing him not only speaking to long-gone poets like Whitman and Garcia Lorca, but by personifying loneliness through these poets. Garcia Lorca struggled with his sexual orientation, much in the same way that Ginsberg did before seeing a therapist and subsequently embracing his orientation. Like Whitman and Ginsberg, Lorca’s work was often banned for homoerotic undertones. The loneliness Ginsberg invokes is a personified feeling of isolation, a lifestyle and poetics that often fit only on the fringes of the societies in which these poets wrote. The use of apostrophe also provides Ginsberg with comrades-in-arms, for all these poets would take offense to the hyper-capitalist symbolism in a neon supermarket.