~ Delta Poetry Review ~

Katherine Baskin

203 Degrees Fahrenheit

It can't be that hot. Can it?

I think of summers on the Mississippi,

the cloying, sticky heat and St. Louisans

reminding me that it’s really the humidity.

I remember my thighs rubbing together,

the wet rings under my arms,

the heat map of sweat soaking my back.

He adjusts the sauna dial to 95 celsius.

I do numerical conversions in my head.

"I've gone up to 100 before," he says

casually. His accent is sharp, precise

and prickly, like spines on a cactus.

"You go shorter sessions."

Now he smirks. It's what Finns do

instead of laugh. "Did you hear

about the Russian guy who died

trying to outlast a Finn in sauna?"

He says the word the right way: sow nah

And I say it right now too.

I shake my head as he opens

the glass door and heat billows out

like the moment before a pie

goes into a ready oven.

Am I apple or pumpkin? I wonder.

"You ready?" His voice is cheerful.

My curiosity has brought me here.

I can say I don't want to be cooked alive.

Instead I shrug. Some kind of peer pressure

propels me into the oven.

It’s dark and romantic,

like being welcomed into a living place.

I draw in breath and my lungs turn to wet fire,

surely my organs are boiling, steaming

like crab legs, like sticky buns.

It feels dangerous, like a caution

on a coffee cup, a warning sticker

on a propane tank. Every fire safety training

blaring alarms in my head.

He scoops a ladle of tar-scented water

and carefully pours it over the hot rocks.

“Electric sauna is cheating. Wood burning is best.”

I imagine the smell of smoldering logs,

and I know that he’s right.

The sweat comes in runnels from places

I thought did not sweat. A red spider pattern

of veins and capillaries appears on my shoulders

as every ounce (milliliter) of moisture rushes

to cool me as I bake. I feel panic seize my chest.

Can I breathe? Is this how the Russian guy felt

just before he died?

I look across the steam at my guide

for confirmation that I should flee.

But his eyes are closed.

He gently scratches his arms and sighs,

like every worry has been drawn

from his lungs and carried away in the air.

Like me, he is red and splotchy, dripping

with salty sweat, peaceful,

perfectly silent.

It becomes sharp-focused:

This is a church, a sanctuary

where god is a fire that

swallows the words Finns don’t say,

empties the bodies, prepares them

to be filled again.

The panic unclenches. I reach down

to rub my wet belly, and exhale

every ghost and let them soak

into the wood, burdens now borne

by the heat and darkness.

Katherine Baskin lived her entire life along the Mississippi River bed, writing about her experiences there, before immigrating to Sweden in 2021. Now her work is about experiencing Nordic life as an outsider, a river rat set sail on the Baltic. She holds a B.A. in English from Southern Illinois University and an M.A. in Professional Writing from Southeast Missouri State University. Her work has been featured in Big Muddy: A Journal of the Mississippi River Valley. www.katherinebaskin.com