Jonas Mekas: Filmmaker, Writer, Anthology Archivist

I came, or, rather, I was brought here by the UN Refugee Organization in 1949 after a year in a Nazi forced labor camp and four years in a postwar displaced persons camp.  I was very, very lost when I came to New York.  I had lost all trust in Western civilization.  I was in shambles — I was in 1000 pieces.

It was New York that saved my sanity.  As I walked through its streets, as I got pulled into its life, into its energy, I began slowly to regain trust in life.  I had lost my home, my friends, my family, the places I loved.  I needed new memories, I desperately needed to connect, to let my roots into a new ground so that the winds of fate would not blow me away.  New York became that ground.  There was an energy here and a trust in life that I needed for my survival, for rebuilding myself.  New York gave me that.  It took a long time, maybe a decade, maybe two.  That’s how long it takes to create new memories, new friends, loves, excitements, events that begin to sink into you and remake you and connect you to a new home, place.  I remember walking the streets of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. People used to stop and ask me what they can do for me, why am I crying.  But I was not crying.  I was only very, very sad and hopeless.  I guess I was crying in my heart without knowing it.  But people saw it.

No, there is no other place like New York.  The young energy, the abandoning oneself to the here and now, not being bogged down by the mistakes of humanity of the past, and the submerging in the present.  It got me, it pulled me in.  And I am still in it.

So here I declare my love for New York, to all its boroughs.  I have lived and worked all over this city.  It has sunk into every cell of my body, my heart, my brain, my soul.  Yes, this is a declaration of my love to my New York.  And I know that my New York is not like any other people’s New York.  I have my special memories, like you have your own.  I have my memories, my loves, dust on my shoes, my special trees I love, my special little spots, bars, streets.  Yes, yes, I love you, you are my wine, my song, and my woman. 

Forgive me my Nameless Woman for saying this.  I know you’ll understand me because you have also declared your love to New York, to Brooklyn, to Coney Island, to its skyline, to its people, its streets, and the way the sun rises in it.  You also needed it.  Like many of us.  So I know I am not the only one.  Angels brought me here like they brought you.  Like they brought all of us here.  So here I declare my unconditional love to my adopted home, my adopted city that saved my sanity and gave me new life. 

This photograph was taken at the Anthology Film Archives in a little room with a large round table which I have adopted as my anarchistic office.  I chose this room for the picture because I have spent so much time here with my friends from all over the world.  We have spent so much time in this room talking, arguing, and also laughing and singing.  It’s full of energy that is so typical of New York and my life.  The young energy, or called it the ageless energy that makes New York always young, always new, always another, always here and now.  And if you don’t feel it, or don’t need it, then keep moving on, jump the next train, you will find your place somewhere else.  But I’ll stay here with my love.