Honors and Awards
- 2019 Ruth Lilly Award
- 2019 Denise Levertov Award
- 2017 NCTE Award for Excellence in Poetry for Children
- 2017 NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature Winner
- 2013 Elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets
- 2012 Poetry Society of America Robert Frost Medal
- 2006 Connecticut Book Award for Lifetime Achievement in Service to the Literary Community
- 2005 Boston Globe/Hornbook Award
- 2002 J.S. Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship
- 2001-2006 Poet Laureate, State of Connecticut
- 2001 Boston Globe/Hornbook Award
- 2001 Flora Stieglitz Straus Award
- 1998 Poets’ Prize
- 1995 Fulbright Teaching Fellowship (France)
- 1992 Anisfield-Wolf Award
- 1990 Connecticut Arts Award
- American Council of Learned Societies, Contemplative Practices Fellowship
- Department of the Army’s Commander’s Award for Public Service
- National Endowment for the Arts fellow, 1981 and 1990