As a long-time reporter, I’ve met a lot of people. Perhaps the most inspiring was our recent  U.S. Poet Laureate, William S. Merwin.

For decades, Merwin has lived off the grid in Hawai‘i. To reach his home, I turned off Maui’s fabled Hana Highway, down a single lane edged with red volcanic soil. About a quarter of a mile from steep cliffs dropping to the sea, the foliage began to grow thick. Rustic wire fencing strained to hold back arching fronds and tropical blooms. His 19-acre palm forest seemed like it was trying to swallow the lane.