It's said he licks the corkscrew! (5)
I believe the answer is:
helix
'corkscrew' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'it's said he licks' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'he' could be 'eli' and 'eli' is located in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
'the' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for helix that I've seen before include "Structure consisting of something wound in a continuous series of loops" , "snail" , "Spiral shape" , "'Spiral structure, DNA is a double one (5)'" , "One of two DNA spirals" .)