On a Recent Indiscretion by a Certain Fulbright Fellow
in Upper Egypt

He fell among the fellahin.
He felt a fellow feeling.
They went in an alfalfa field
Where they began unpeeling.

The muezzin he caught sight of them
From the high minaret
And what he saw made him as mad
As a holy man can get.

He foamed and fumed and frothed at them
Then pelted them with quince.
The Fulbright Fellow has not faced
His fellow Fellows since.

A fast felucca ferried him
Past the Nile's fair fronded fringes
But when he reached his consulate
His mind was off his hinges.

'Farewell to the falafel farm,
Farewell the ful medames,
Farewell the fez, the Fatimids,
Farouk in my pajamas,

'Far from these fair fringe benefits
My feeble prospects beckon
And I shall fray my future away
In frigging Llanfairfechan.'

The fellah in this episode
Who hailed from Wadi Halfa
Has found that Fulbright Felllowship
Where it lay in the alfalfa

And fiendishly invested it
In French securities
To furnish his foul flock with funds
For forseeable dynasties.

And the moral of this episode
May be set forth forthrightly
Don't go fellating fellahin!
You're a Fulbright Fellow! It's unsightly!

James Fenton, "Out of Danger Poems".
Special Thanks to Bill Rileyfor contributing this piece.