There's a literal and literary use of the word in
The Naked Lunch that is chillingly beautiful, describing an elderly drug addict. I haven't got the book here, but it is something like:
The old junkie has found a vein. Blood blossoms in the dropper like a Chinese flower. He push home the heroin. [...] How many years threaded on a needle of blood.
The image of the blood in the syringe resembling a flower opening in Chinese tea is the most striking literary use of veins that I can think of.