THE WAY TO START A DAY

Though urging a return to simpler societies' obeisance to nature has become a pious cliche, Byrd Baylor can still make the invitation as newly compelling as the rise of each day's sun. ""The way to start a day/ is this--,"" she begins. ""Go outside/ and face the east/ and greet the sun/ with some kind of/ blessing/ or chant/ or song/ that you made yourself/ and keep for/ early morning."" The way to make the song is ""just [to] sing it"" when you feel the sun--as they did in Peru, Mexico, the Congo, and other places whose chants, drums, offerings, and ceremonial salutes to the sunrise Baylor evokes in her quietly charged lines. And, if Parnall's decorative style hasn't proved quite as renewable, his crisp lines and sun colors are still spankingly attractive and splendidly attuned.