By the black iron fence of the Jewish cemetery is a hillside covered in bloodroot

red sap bled from broken stems and for a second i pictured tendrils tapping into graves, sucking out whatever lifeblood a cemetery full of corpses has left, seeping onto my fingers through the broken stems of the blood root in full bloom.

i'm in a dark mood.

it'll pass.

Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis) is a perennial, herbaceous flowering plant native to eastern North America from Nova Scotia, Canada southward to Florida, United States. It is the only species in the genus Sanguinaria, and is included in the family Papaveraceae and most closely related to Eomecon of eastern Asia.

Bloodroot is also known as bloodwort, red puccoon root, and sometimes pauson. Bloodroot has also been known as tetterwort in America, although that name is used in Britain to refer to Greater Celandine.

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Bloodroot is one of many plants whose seeds are spread by ants, a process called myrmecochory. The seeds have a fleshy organ called an elaiosome that attracts ants. The ants take the seeds to their nest, where they eat the elaiosomes, and put the seeds in their nest debris, where they are protected until they germinate. They also get the added bonus of growing in a medium made richer by the ant nest debris.

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The United States FDA has approved the inclusion of sanguinarine in toothpastes as an antibacterial or anti-plaque agent.^{[10][11][12][13]} Currently, it is believed that this use may cause leukoplakia, a premalignant oral lesion.^[14] On 24 Nov 2003, the Colgate-Palmolive Company of Piscataway, New Jersey, United States commented by memorandum to the United States Food and Drug Administration that then-proposed rules for levels of sanguinarine in mouthwash and dental wash products were lower than necessary.^[15] However, this conclusion is controversial.^[16]

Some animal food additives sold and distributed in Europe such as Phytobiotics' Sangrovit contain sanguinarine and chelerythrine. On 14 May 2003, Cat Holmes reported in Georgia Faces^[17] that Jim Affolter and Selima Campbell, horticulturists at the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, were meeting with Phytobiotics to relate their research into commercial cultivation of bloodroot. It is also used in the mole remover Dermatend.

Bloodroot extracts have also been promoted by some supplement companies as a treatment or cure for cancer, but the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has listed some of these products among its "187 Fake Cancer 'Cures' Consumers Should Avoid".^[18]

Bloodroot is a popular red natural dye used by Native American artists, especially among southeastern rivercane basketmakers.^[19]