The Making retells the universe through science and story, tracing the arc of the cosmos from its origin to the present. The poem recounts the early transformations of the universe, the emergence and development of life on Earth, and the broad span of human history, pairing each new phase with a story--stories drawn from Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as well as from North American Indigenous traditions, Greek myth, and international creation tales and folktales. Coaxing science and history into evocative language while braiding them with tales, the poem sets a human perspective on the pageant of the cosmos and provides an unprecedented synthesis of evolutionary history with literary and religious imagination. The Making is a lyrical and pluralistic creation story of epic scope--a story that illuminates our time of planetary crisis and imagines ways we might press forward.
Industry Reviews
“Brian Day’s The Making is a modern epic of the human universe—incantatory, propulsive, mesmerizing in rhythm and language, in story and myth. In this engaging and immersive read, one falls deeply under the spell of creation—the scientific wonder of the universe and the human wonder of this unique and visionary tale.”
—Karl Meade, author of doom eager
“Be dazzled and blessed by the pantheon of religious and mythical figures who join forces with science to tell the history of the universe in Brian Day’s The Making. His lyrical poetry makes the most of their divinely intricate narratives, weaving multifaith threads into a satisfying whole. He centers the offbeat, embodied, under-told sides of figures ranging from Vishnu and Sky-Woman to Jesus and his angel-activated mother, crafting poetry that transcends heaven and earth.”
—Kittredge Cherry, author of Jesus in Love: A Novel
“With The Making, Brian Day sets himself a daunting task—to tell the story of the universe in one long poem. Astonishingly enough, he succeeds thanks to dazzling language that’s both fierce and precise and an exhilarating vision that brings together Snow White and the Buddha, angels and electrons, dinosaurs and Muhammad to tell the one story, all the stories, our story. Day’s teeming imagination opens our hearts as well as our minds to the interdependent wonders of our multifarious universe.”
—Murray Reiss, author of The Survival Rate of Butterflies in the Wild
“With a unique voice, rich language, and inspired cadence, The Making weaves the story of the universe from ‘the day biology was born’ through legend and myth ‘to the bowl and the birth of the stars’ through the world’s religions and on to the current climate crisis to find ‘not hope but hope in hope’s existence.’ This poet is intimate with language and its power to transform words beyond words.”
—Christine Smart, author of The White Crow
“Brian Day presses forward through the arc of the cosmos with language that’s brilliantly alive. Among gods and thousands of mirrors, ‘matter and story pour themselves into being.’ The poet tells us that it begins with desire. We listen; we praise.”
—Sandi Johnson, author of The Comfort of Angels
