Direct English poet's never drinking alcohol (8)
I believe the answer is:
engineer
'direct' is the definition.
('engineer' can be a synonym of 'direct')
'english poet's never drinking alcohol' is the wordplay.
'english' becomes 'e' (abbreviation).
'poet's never' becomes 'neer' ('ne'er' is a poetic variant for 'never').
'drinking' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'alcohol' becomes 'gin' (gin is a kind of alcohol).
'neer' enclosing 'gin' is 'ngineer'.
'e'+'ngineer'='ENGINEER'
(Other definitions for engineer that I've seen before include "Cleverly bring about" , "Mastermind" , "US or Canadian train driver" , "Bring about, being skilled in machinery" , "Train driver, say" .)