“A prairie farm, a prairie town, family memories—a lesser book made of these would risk nostalgia. But not Offerings. These poems cut right through any idea that living close to the land is ever simple. Here are the complex truths of a girlhood spent growing up among the wheat—a deadbeat boyfriend, an unplanned pregnancy, wounded neighbors, missing neighbors, a grandma who knows more than she lets on. Cinematic, urgent, and precise, Offerings reminds us that love is work and work is love; that for all of us, ‘Harvest is coming, / and there’s so much work to be done before / the last grain truck gets driven to town.’”

“Offerings by Dana Salvador is a tender, honest depiction of life in oft overlooked rural America through the lens of a young woman’s coming of age. Through narratives of lost limbs and misplaced innocence amid a backdrop of ‘broken, golden stalks’ of harvested corn fields hemmed by ‘narrow country roads’ and ‘cow trails,’ this collection deftly examines the dual nature of attachment: that which we love, which enables our growth and freedom of expression, can tie us to a life outgrown. Honoring the hard-earned successes of neighbors overcoming, or succumbing to, adversity and celebrating tender gestures such as that of a father who keeps his daughter’s folded poem in his breast pocket ready to share, Offerings provides voice to a shrinking population and vanishing way of life.”

                                   —Lisa Hase-Jackson, author of Insomnia in AnotherTown and Flint & Fire