NOT EVERYDAY AN AURORA BOREALIS FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY

In this poem, a near-abstract thing is given, the aurora borealis, to the writer's love, ``stretching high into the sky, that fine big stack of shimmering swimmering lights, that good old reliable aurora borealis.'' Lobel's interpretation owes something to Cooper Edens's If You're Afraid of the Dark, Remember the Night Rainbow, portraying the poetic lines literally so that the light show is depicted as a pile of bladders of color delivered to a woman's doorstep. The earnest soul who delivers the aurora borealis becomes entangled in the lights; for those who must postpone knowing what happens to him, a ribbon has been affixed to mark the spot. It's an odd production; Sandburg's sentiments and Lobel's heart and color sense are certainly all in the right place, but the result (with the book's title appearing on the back of the jacket) is fussy and bewildering. (Picture book/poetry. 3-6)