Peter Yarrow's latest book was about to debut at No. 1 on the Publishers Weekly bestseller list, but his thoughts were on the past. Mary Travers, his partner in the 1960s folk-singing trio Peter, Paul and Mary, had just died.

``I had this book tour that was starting, but I was mourning and organizing Mary's memorial at Riverside Church,'' Yarrow said. ``It was hard for me to think about anything else when I was talking about her and singing 500 Miles and recalling when we first sang for President Kennedy.''

Yarrow will be in Miami Sunday for the Alper JCC Jewish Book Festival. He'll introduce his latest illustrated song book, Day is Done, with gorgeous paintings by the Caldecott Honor-winning artist Melissa Sweet. But you can bet he'll still be thinking about Travers, who died Sept. 16 at 72 after a long struggle with leukemia.

``Folk music allows people to express their feelings,'' Yarrow said. ``I don't think the civil rights movement would have been the same if we hadn't sung together.''

Peter, Paul and Mary were a trio for just a decade, but songs like Blowin' in the Wind and If I Had a Hammer became anthems of 1960s protest movements.

Yarrow's later-in-life resurgence in popularity (he is 71) may even eclipse his early success.

``How many folk singers have a record that sells a million copies?'' he asks, referring to sales for his first illustrated song book, Puff the Magic Dragon, which was packaged with a CD of songs performed by Yarrow, his daughter Bethany and cellist Rufus Cappadocia. ``The answer is none. This is an incredible vehicle for folk singers.''

He's an unlikely evangelist for picture books given that he spent 15 years resisting his agent's idea of turning Puff, which Yarrow co-wrote in 1959, into a children's book. It was only after his daughter asked him to perform with her that he had a change of heart.

``I realized that by singing with Bethany, these songs would have a fresh vitality,'' Yarrow said. ``It's not just taking an old Peter, Paul and Mary song and putting pictures to it. It's a way of bringing these songs back into the classrooms and the churches and the synagogues.''

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