lacerate

While large shards of plastic can lacerate organ walls, the smaller particles, known as microplastics, can be just as deleterious.

From Salon ● Mar. 8, 2023

When Brady doesn’t face quick pressure, he is typically able to lacerate opposing defenses with short passes.

From Seattle Times ● Jan. 30, 2019

Despite the carping of her critics, Clinton does in fact lacerate herself for losing.

From Slate ● Sep. 14, 2017

Commercial radio did not arrive until 1920, and 1916 phonographs would lacerate 2017 sensibilities, as would 1916’s silent movies.

From Washington Post ● May 5, 2017

It acts more as a subsoiler and will tear and lacerate more roots than is desirable.

From The Cocoanut With reference to its products and cultivation in the Philippines by Lyon, William S. (Scrugham)

Baumbach’s signature serio-comic touch, in which the humor lacerates as much as the drama, should be in full effect here.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2025

The district court lacerates the argument simply by restating it:

From Slate ● Dec. 4, 2023

This summer lacerates us as we gradually accept that warnings won’t work.

From Washington Post ● Aug. 9, 2021

As it is, spare a thought for likely runner-up, Michelle Williams for Manchester by the Sea, who lacerates your heart in a fraction of Davis’ screen time.

From The Guardian ● Feb. 23, 2017

Throughout his life he seems to have made a hobby of the literature that arouses violent emotion and mental excitement, or lacerates the nerves, or shocks and startles.

From The Tale of Terror A Study of the Gothic Romance by Birkhead, Edith

"I'm convinced that if my nerve was lacerated tomorrow I would have our implant put in," he said.

From BBC ● Feb. 10, 2026

Judge Cote lacerated the plaintiff attorneys for cherry-picking evidence and ignoring studies that have found no causal link.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2025

He left the room, returning with a metronome whose loud, mechanical clicking lacerated the otherwise-fine mood being created by a Bach record on the turntable.

From Salon ● Apr. 19, 2025

After sitting out three games with a lacerated liver, he returned to play in a school-record 149 plays from scrimmage this month against Stanford.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 27, 2023

It was well past midnight by the time Kote made it back to Newarre with Chronicler’s limp body slung across his lacerated shoulders.

From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss

Ms. MeLampy is at her best when she eschews personal narrative in favor of her lacerating accounts of the animal festivals she visits.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 26, 2025

After a cooling-off period, the two bumped into each other again and found, to their surprise and delight, that they shared a love of verbal sparring via lacerating, relentless wit.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 29, 2024

"But all the while he's lacerating and battering himself about not being able to write, because, for him, writing only meant writing the novel."

From BBC ● Mar. 23, 2024

On Friday, he continued his streak of lacerating rulings.

From Seattle Times ● Feb. 16, 2024

This impression was dispelled early on when a probationer in Briony’s year, a large, kindly, slow-moving girl with a cow’s harmless gaze, met the lacerating force of the ward sister’s fury.

From "Atonement" by Ian McEwan