Hesitate to free up article trapped inside (6)
I believe the answer is:
dither
'hesitate' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'free up article trapped inside' is the wordplay.
'free' becomes 'rid' ('rid' can be a synonym of 'free'**).
'up' says the letters should be written backwards (in down clue: letters go upwards).
'article' becomes 'the' (the 'definite article' part of speech).
'trapped inside' is an insertion indicator.
'rid' reversed gives 'dir'.
'dir' going around 'the' is 'DITHER'.
'to' acts as a link.
(Other definitions for dither that I've seen before include "Vacillate, be undecided" , "Hesitate, haver" , "Hestitate indecisively" , "Keep hesitating" , "Hit red in order to vacillate" .)