7:15 — the market's bustling!
Elegant old black cars,
polished new, zip along King Street.
Shaggy-hoofed horses draw carriages.
An old steam engine rolls
on the world's smallest track.
Wood stalls full of cauliflowers, cabbages
at odds with April.
It's 1901, Buffalo (posters proclaim).
My eye doctor's old office: a photography shop.
A securities firm: the Elmwood Hotel.
St. George's Cathedral: a post office
with great green wings to adjust the light.
Is that Mia Wasikowska floating down the street,
twinkling star in a long brown dress?

A week of preparation for the filming:
horses, carriages, old cars, engine and its track,
fake greenery, a mound of earth, to “dress” the street,
trucked in.

Lights, cameras, it's like walking into someone's dream.
But the set's only skin deep.
You can't buy the cauliflowers.
If you asked an extra to tea you'd find
someone from now in the shell of 1901.

It's all about getting in position.
Create the image: record the shot.

All this for three minutes of finished film.

Early afternoon, the shooting's over,
set starting to dissolve;
the circus leaving town.

In its wake: orange pylons warning
streets are being undressed
returned to pavement,
A film of mud the only trace of

enchantment as the market returns
to tulips, asparagus — the weave of April days.