Read this excerpt from Allen Ginsberg’s "A Supermarket in California."I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking among the meats in the refrigerator. Why does Ginsberg make an allusion to Walt Whitman in this excerpt?

Ginsberg addresses Whitman directly and imagines him as a lonely outsider in an ordinary modern setting. The phrase “childless, lonely old grubber” creates a sense of shared marginalization, while the supermarket encounter suggests an intimate, imaginative connection between the two poets. The allusion therefore conveys familiarity and kinship with Whitman and other outcasts, not merely knowledge of his writing or shopping habits.

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