Wear down engineer with poem (5)

I believe the answer is:

erode

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'wear down' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'engineer with poem' is the wordplay.
'engineer with' becomes 'er' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'poem' becomes 'ode' (ode is a kind of poem).
'er'+'ode'='ERODE'

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for erode that I've seen before include "Slowly remove" , "Gradually wear away" , "'Deteriorate, wear away (5)'" , "Corrode" , "Become ground down or deteriorate" .)

I've seen this clue in The Mirror.

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