Sprawling tufted annual; culms slender, 4–38 cm. high, geniculately ascending from a decumbent base, often rooting at the lower nodes. Leaf-blades flat, 1–13 cm. long, 1.5–7 mm. wide, usually conspicuously papillose-hispid, sharply acuminate. Inflorescence compact, composed of (2–)4–7(-11) oblong to broadly oblong spikes 0.8–1.8 cm. long clustered together in a dense, often subglobose head. Spikelets 3–5-flowered, broadly ovate, 4.1–5.2 mm. long; glumes subequal, 1.7–2.3 mm. long, the lower narrowly lanceolate-oblong in profile, the keel thick, scabrid and often narrowly winged, the upper narrowly elliptic-oblong in profile, the keel extended into a stout awn shorter than or equalling the glume; lemmas lanceolate to narrowly ovate in profile, (3–)3.3–4.3 mm. long, acuminate, the keel concave, thick and scabrid above the middle and extended into a stout mucro up to 1 mm. long; palea-keels winged; anthers 0.3–0.5 mm. long. Grain 0.75–1.1 mm. long, broadly elliptic to obovate in profile, dome-shaped across the top, finely granular or granular-striate.