Scratches said paragraph (6)
I believe the answer is:
clause
'paragraph' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'scratches said' is the wordplay.
'scratches' becomes 'claws' (clawing is a kind of scratching).
'said' indicates a 'sounds like' (homophone) clue.
'claws' is a homophone of 'CLAUSE'.
(Other definitions for clause that I've seen before include "Subdivision of a sentence" , "Subunit of a sentence" , "Bill's article" , "Subordinate part of sentence" , "Separate section of a legal document" .)