I recently published an essay (now available at www.worldhum.com) in which I complained that travel writing doesn't get the audience it deserves. I suggested that it has become like poetry, read primarily by those who write it.
Poetry, however, gets more respect, in part because it has no "consumer division." No poem ever comes with hotel recommendations.
But poetry doesn't get a free ride either, I realized this weekend at the writers' conference in Grand Cayman. One of the poets in attendance, talking about writing classes, noted: "Poetry is always foisted on children, seniors and prisoners."
