A touching article or tract (4)
I believe the answer is:
area
'tract' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'a touching article' is the wordplay.
'touching' becomes 're' (re can mean touching or regarding).
'article' becomes 'a' (the indefinite article in English).
'a'+'re'+'a'='AREA'
'or' is the link.
(Other definitions for area that I've seen before include "Region, space" , "Expanse of a surface" , "Field of activity or surface" , "part of town" , "land" .)