Lower Providence Aikido

When the poet Walt Whitman wrote of 'the body electric' he had no notion of the deep connection these words would have with the ancient art of Karate. Well, poets are usually to be found in some abstract upper realm, floating with ideas and concepts quaint and rare. What most people don't understand is that martial artists have existence in that same realm...maybe even a little higher, a little finer.

It is undeniable, a martial artist is a poet. His canvas, if I can mix metaphors sightly, is his movement impressed upon the universe. Like a child with sparklers on a moonless night, the martial artist sculpts a geometry immaculate, and illuminates a spirit possessed.

Interestingly, these poetic venturings have rules of physics imbedded within. While there is an art to poetry, there is an art and a science to the martial arts. It is only by understanding this science may one make the final break and truly manifest the art pure.

No, it is not a thing of muscle and bone, though those are necessary in the beginning, for one to begin to create. It is energy, glowing and luminescent energy, which causes the spark in the karate body divine. And, that noted, one should know that energy relates directly to electricity, and to the rules of that science.

The tan tien, that hard to find, little point two inches below the navel, is a generator. Breath to the tan tien, and imagine to that spot, and energy glows, and the body is astart. Then does the energy course, and then does the map of the body glow, and then does the imagination start to soar.

Through the pathways of the body, exploring the chakras, which are but switchboards. Tightening the pressures points, which are but sockets, making them immune to attack. Coursing the ethereal imaginations in currents that pulse geometric through the frame.

Pulsing the energy here, there, putting it into kata and bunkai, strengthening the body with an energy not known to the mere mortal. Then, with a sputter and a throb, the machine lurches neon, it is life! And the delicious thought is motored through the self...do not mess with this person, I am alive!

Yet, it is not all about the body, for the body is just the platform, the sling for the shot, the method of propulsion for the projection of the spirit and imagination that we really are. It is in the outward grace, the feline motion, the ability to caper divine even in the face of the bringers of death and destruction. Yes, I sing the Karate body, and some may not like it, but they just don't know...they just don't understand.