How We Bleed
JONATHAN YUNGKANS

I put on rawhide gloves,
wrestle bougainvillea’s

overgrowth—long years in thorns,
fuscia bracts crepe-paper dry

and Grandma and Pappy gone
with their vine now 30 years

to this one’s hundred. How deep
the loss has rooted in soil

weeks before crimson and gold,
lush leaves and grievery’s weight.

I prune my vine, remember
what can’t be cut or brought back,

feel what colors the thorns draw,
vibrant as blood through rawhide.



Jonathan Yungkans is currently an MFA student at California State University, Long Beach. As a Los-Angeles-native poet, writer and photographer he maintains an intense love for the sea and local history. His works have appeared in Lime Hawk, Silver Birch Press, Twisted Vine Literary Journal and other publications.