Poor poet's unusual attempt to become engaged (7,2)

'engaged' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't judge whether it can be defined by this definition.

'poor poet's unusual attempt to' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
an anagram of 'poor' is 'ropo' which is present in the answer.
'to' is found in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

'become' is the link.

Can you help me to learn more?