poets hitchhiking in the dairy section
 A Supermarket in California Allen Ginsberg 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? [complete poem] first read this probably in 1961 or '62 followed by allen reading in 1963 at the vancouver poetry conference where days earlier i met among others bill bissett. two years later i ran into allen in a supermarket in california. last year i ran into bill in a supermarket in vancouver, where lenore took photo for forthcoming history book, my generation shopping for dinner what thoughts tonight of you bill for i walked the soup aisle dreaming that i walked home dreaming of bean soup i'd make from a can found next to the poems of bissett where everything's on special tonight no peaches but a carton of pomegranate juice an orange lost among the apples and dark coffee for weary old bones |