OUTSIDE BUCKINGHAM PALACE

Behind the Palace the sky is the colour of an RAF uniform, air force blue, no doubt about it. I cycle round the huge monument at the front.  Queen Victoria is flanked by gods and goddesses and symbols of the British Empire as was. 

Already at nearly eight-thirty in the morning tourists, Japanese, are in hot pursuit of the first day’s photographs.

I halt my journey to Victoria and circle back to the front of this coliseum and park up to make a drawing.

Lines on paper and a string of traffic around this Circus with black cabs bumper to bumper. Then the lights change and like beetles waiting for someone to lift a stone, under which they nestle, off they go down The Mall.  My output is hastily annotated by notes so I remember greys, the deep bronze to black on statues and all the gold leaf that now and then catches some hope of sun.

I too scuttle off to my meeting.