How to Use lacerate in a Sentence

lacerate

verb
  • The broken glass lacerated his feet.
  • The patient's hand was severely lacerated.
  • For much of the show, the stage was bathed in blue light that was lacerated at times by white spotlights.
    Timothy Finn, kansascity, 25 Apr. 2018
  • What is the record going to be for somebody who gets their heart lacerated?
    Taylor Weatherby, Billboard, 22 Dec. 2017
  • The attacks had fractured his left leg and lacerated his scalp.
    Joanna Slater, Washington Post, 2 July 2019
  • One room is full of dress forms wearing fur coats whose backsides are splattered and lacerated with paint.
    Sharon Mizota, latimes.com, 18 June 2019
  • The bullet lacerated Jenkins’ tongue, broke his jaw and went out through his neck.
    Dakin Andone, CNN, 14 Aug. 2023
  • Sanabria’s lawyer said the inmates beat him so badly that his skull was fractured, his nose broken and his face lacerated.
    Jim Wyss, miamiherald, 22 May 2018
  • But there are many more angles to come, some of them unusually lacerating.
    Sheri Linden, The Hollywood Reporter, 11 June 2023
  • The lawsuit states a deputy placed a gun in Jenkins’ mouth and shot him, lacerating his tongue and breaking his jaw.
    Devon M. Sayers, CNN, 5 July 2023
  • But in our endless, self-lacerating culture wars, nothing is ever over.
    Kevin Baker, Harper's magazine, 28 Oct. 2019
  • Her parents fed that self-lacerating attitude by being appalled by her new job.
    Douglas Perry, OregonLive.com, 7 June 2017
  • The stabbing had lacerated his spleen, pancreas and kidney, Chen wrote.
    Hannah Fry, latimes.com, 13 Apr. 2018
  • His scalp and liver were lacerated, his femur, sacrum and multiple ribs were broken.
    Andrew Wolfson, The Courier-Journal, 5 Apr. 2018
  • Trent has spent a lot of his life minimizing other people and lacerating them in the press — all to create a name for himself.
    Vulture, 22 Mar. 2023
  • The bullet fired into Jenkins’ mouth lacerated his tongue and broke his jaw, then exited his neck.
    Michael Goldberg, Anchorage Daily News, 4 Aug. 2023
  • Within minutes, Gorsuch lay dead on the ground, his body riddled with bullets and lacerated by corn knives.
    James Delle, Smithsonian Magazine, 17 Jan. 2020
  • Wright argues Lyles used so much force that Xavier’s liver was lacerated in three places and his kidney was damaged.
    Keith L. Alexander, Washington Post, 29 Oct. 2017
  • Despite the carping of her critics, Clinton does in fact lacerate herself for losing.
    Michelle Goldberg, Slate Magazine, 14 Sep. 2017
  • Gilman was shot in the back; the bullet punctured a lung, lacerated her spleen and a kidney, broke two ribs and lodged 2 millimeters from her spinal cord.
    Fox News, 27 Sep. 2018
  • The bullet went through breast tissue, shattered a rib, lacerated her liver and then exited her body, the lawsuit says.
    Eliott C. McLaughlin, CNN, 11 Oct. 2017
  • By the end of the fight, at least three students were hurt by Clarke and a mirror on the wall was cracked, punched by a student who lacerated his hand, deputies say.
    Milena Malaver, Miami Herald, 24 Sep. 2025
  • Later, the ship’s propellers accidentally lacerate a baby whale in a stream of bright red gore.
    Robyn Bahr, The Hollywood Reporter, 22 Mar. 2023
  • That beaver nearly killed the elderly swimmer, tearing chunks of flesh from his arms and legs and lacerating multiple tendons in his hands.
    Kris Millgate, Field & Stream, 27 July 2023
  • The tone is a cross between the lacerating wit of Stephen Colbert and the in-the-weeds wonkery of Ezra Klein.
    David French, National Review, 23 Jan. 2018
  • Cyber weapons do not have to be cutting-edge to lacerate a community, a company, or a country, either.
    Sue Halpern, The New Yorker, 6 Jan. 2020
  • The woman’s stomach had been lacerated and many of her internal organs removed, police said.
    Charles Rabin, miamiherald, 30 Oct. 2017
  • In the last year, Huston has broken his eye socket — twice — and his jaw, as well as lacerating his kidney, per posts on his social media.
    Camila Pedrosa, Sacbee.com, 28 June 2026
  • Catherine’s right leg was lacerated to the bone and nearly amputated by a propeller.
    Grethel Aguila, Miami Herald, 20 Oct. 2025
  • These people may have all the money in the world, but as the last four seasons have shown us in vivid, lacerating detail, their cold, loveless lives inspire little envy.
    Chloe Walker, Longreads, 25 May 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'lacerate.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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