He started to explain that by the last stanza, he meant that from the very first second, she was the best, and that is the only way the phrase 'second best' could possibly apply to her, except that wouldn't quite work with the meter he'd previously established. When Sappho gasped his name and began to cry, however, the words died in his throat. "I'm ... ah ... not used to writing poetry in English," he whispered feebly, shrugging. "I hope you can overlook the tortured rhymes and bad meter. I'm not the best poet in the world." He shrugged and stopped then when he realised he was starting to babble. She obviously liked the poem, so he shouldn't apologise for having written it -- or at least for not having re-written it a few more times.