Tokens in an Indian Graveyard
Poems
by Linda Hussa

This book is a journey of two cultures living side by side. The Paiute People endured the coming of white settlers to their home country of Surprise Valley and Nevada’s High Desert. These poems and stories define their gift of friendship to five generations of the Hussa Family.

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"These stories and poems happened or were told to me the way we pass on all important information—by having enthusiasm for a story. Sometimes we can even recall how the day was when it happened, or how happy it made us feel to hear the story, or how sad, and how we began immediately making it our own, that is what I’ve written here, stories, so we do not forget.

Tokens are around us every minute of our lives, connections to people here and gone, memories to ground us, and fulfill us. Tokens help us to understand we must participate fully. It is our duty. It is our gift."

— From the author's Introduction

Tokens in an Indian Graveyard  are tales of kindness and charity, but also of prejudice and downright meanness; a history of the Fort Bidwell Indian School and the systematic destruction of Native culture. Tokens sustains the ancient conversation between the land and its human cultures. From their shared wisdom, Linda Hussa weaves lessons of hope and survival.

—Jerry Martien, author of
Pieces In Place, The Shell Game

How wonderful to partake of the wit, wisdom, and vitality of life in the Surprise Valley region. Thank you, Linda Hussa!

—Lawson Fusao Inada
Oregon Poet Laureate

The poems in this volume are like the land and people Linda Hussa celebrates, spare, yet so rich, luminous, and evocative that the language  seems charmed.  Her work observes the ancient critical dictum that poetry must delight and teach.

—Joyce Peterson,  author of
Curs’d Example the Duchess of Malfi
and Commonweal Tragedy

LINDA HUSSA is a nationally acclaimed poet, writer, and rancher living in Cedarville, California. She is the author of six books, including Blood Sister, I Am To These Fields (2002), which won the Western Heritage Award, the Western Writers of America award, and the Women Writing the West award as best poetry book of the year. Linda is a frequent participant at the National Cowbly Poetry Gathering in Elko, Nevada and gives readings throughout the West.