Poet's line nicked by Republican president (5)
I believe the answer is:
rilke
'poet's' is the definition.
(I know that Rilke is a poets)
'line nicked by republican president' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'line' could be 'l' (used when specifying particular lines from a poem) and 'l' is found within the answer.
'republican' could be 'r' (abbreviation) and 'r' is found within the answer.
'president' could be 'ike' (nickname of Dwight Eisenhower) and 'ike' is located in the leftover letters.
No letters remain.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for rilke that I've seen before include "Rainer Maria --, Austrian poet" , "he once wrote" , "Rainer Maria ---, German poet" , "Bohemian poet?" .)