Claudia Lapp (1946-2026)
What
is time, Claudia and
why
does it announce itself in the past tense?
Is
it because I found you in the 1982 anthology, leafing back
to
front, halted by the one and only Irving Layton,
preceded
by LaMontagne’s Le Bateau Ivre,
and
there, in between, the one and only Claudia Lapp, the
initial
gang member CEL, literally between us --
Who
wants to know what you saw then that we did not see?
I’ll
wait.
Is
it because time waits
as
it waited for you
to
see the vision
and
it came in a dream
with
thund’ring hooves
beneath
your thighs
your
shoulders sprouted wings, O Claudia!
and
our earantennae
and
our nostril chalices
and
our temple ears
now
tuned to your voice, Claudia
O
Claudia
Tom Konyves is a poet, essayist, curator and videopoetry theorist. His career began in Montreal in the late 1970s, when he joined one of Canada’s first artist-run centres, Vehicule Art, where he was instrumental in the forming of the seven Vehicule Poets.
Having coined the term videopoetry in 1978, Tom Konyves is considered to be "one of the original pioneers of the form". In 2011, he published the ground-breaking Videopoetry: A Manifesto, a “definitive guide” which to date has garnered more than 30,000 views from 68 countries. He is the author of eight books of poetry and a surrealist novella.
