Author's short piece of verse (3)
I believe the answer is:
poe
'author's' is the definition.
(Edgar Allan Poe)
'short piece of verse' is the wordplay.
'short' means to remove the last letter.
'piece of verse' becomes 'poem' (I've seen this before).
'poem' with its final letter taken off is 'POE'.
(Other definitions for poe that I've seen before include "Edgar Allan --, US poet and author" , "American short story writer" , "Short-story writer" , "Edgar Allan . . ., writer of spooky tales" , "The Raven poet" .)