Prize: David Rivard, Torque Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry: Howard Nemerov AML Award for poetry to Robert A. Christmas for "Self-Portrait as Brigham Young" Frost Medal: Robert Creeley / Sterling Brown Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress: Richard Wilbur Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Rita Dove, Thomas and Beulah Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize: Philip Levine Whiting Awards: Mark Cox, Michael Ryan William Carlos Williams Award: Alan Shapiro, Happy Hour Fellowship of the Academy of American Poets: Josephine Jacobsen and Alfred Corn Births Penny Boxall, British poet Deaths Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article: January 14 – Ewart Milne, 83 (born 1903), Irish poet and radical February 22 – Glenway Wescott, 85 (born 1901), American novelist and poet, from a stroke June 22 – John Hewitt, 79 (born 1907), Irish poet August 23 – Samar Sen, 70 (born 1916), Bengali poet and journalist September 11 – Ladislav Stehlík (born 1908), Czech poet, writer and painter September 16 – Howard Moss, 65 (born 1922), poetry editor of The New Yorker'', from a heart attack November 6 – John Logan (born 1923), American poet November 29 – Gwendolyn MacEwen, 46 (born 1941) Canadian poet and novelist, alcohol-related December 29 – Jun Ishikawa 石川淳 pen name of Ishikawa Kiyoshi, Ishikawa, 88 (born 1899), Japanese, Shōwa period modernist author, translator and literary critic Also – Vaughan Morgan (born 1907), New Zealand shepherd-poet See also Poetry List of years in poetry List of poetry awards Notes 20th-century poetry Poetry 1987 poems