Love Marks

The water in the pan laps at the sides,
At my fingers.
Just begging for a kiss.
And so I let it, let it kiss until it burns,
until the burn washes away to nothing.
Until it sears itself a promise on my skin.
'I love you so much it hurts.'
This is a lot like the way I loved you,
the way I would let you pet my hair and you would scratch trying to pull me closer to your love.
How sometimes you would leave bruises on my delicate flesh because you loved me too much.
Kisses that often times tasted of my own blood because we could never be close enough.
The way our love seared scars into the hard muscles of my heart.
I rub my thumb where the boiling water kissed too fiercely,
thinking of all the times I touched the bruises you left,
love marks I still don't know how to forget.
I write yet another poem about a love that has been long since dead,
but this time it is a lot more like examining a  fossil than excavating its bones from the tomb.
It has been so long that all that is left are imprints of a forgotten thing.
So why do I wish it were breathing still?