Before, in poetry

As a detective solving the mystery of the crossword clue ‘Before, in poetry‘, the first thing that pops into my mind is that the clue is asking for a poetic synonym for ‘before‘. I start thinking about the different words and phrases used in poetry to convey the idea of something coming before something else. My mind wanders to medieval poetry, with its use of archaic language and syntax. I mull over classic poetic terms such as ‘erewhile‘, ‘previously‘, or ‘heretofore‘. Finally, it hits me. ‘Ere‘! It is a concise and poetic way to convey the idea of ‘before‘. I feel a sense of satisfaction as I jot down the answer ‘ERE‘ in the crossword puzzle in front of me. The power of language amazes me as I unravel yet another linguistic mystery.