Tears back showing some spirit (4)
I believe the answer is:
rips
'tears' is the definition.
('rip' can be a synonym of 'tear')
'back showing some spirit' is the wordplay.
'back' says the letters should be written in reverse.
'showing' becomes 'sp' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'some' indicates the central letters.
The middle letters of 'spirit' are 'ir'.
'sp'+'ir'='spir'
'spir' reversed gives 'RIPS'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for rips that I've seen before include "cuts" , "Tears violently" .)