Erect annual herb, 10–40 cm. tall, simple or with a few to numerous long, ascending branches; stem and branches slender, striate, glabrous or with short, asperulous hairs especially towards the base. Leaves elliptic or sometimes narrowly oblanceolate, 6–27 × 2–7 mm., glabrous or sometimes asperulous along the 2–5 mm. long petiole. Inflorescence creamy, stramineous or pale yellowish tinged with pink, densely spicate, 5–20 × 4–5 mm., solitary, geminate or clustered at the apices of the stem and branches, usually subtended at the base by one or more reduced leaves. Bracts and bracteoles persistent after fruit-fall, 1.25–1.5 mm. long, lanceolate, acute or shortly acuminate, membranaceous, more or less serrulate at the apex, very shortly mucronate with the excurrent midrib. Tepals 1.75–2.25 mm. long, glabrous, oblong, acute, distinctly denticulate in the apical third with the teeth commonly divergent or even recurved, less distinctly so below, very shortly mucronate with the excurrent midrib. Filaments with the free apex subequalling the basal cup; no intermediate teeth present. Ovary biovulate; stigmas 2, erect, very short, shorter than the c. 0.25 mm. long style. Capsule subglobose, c. 1.5 mm. long, not exceeding the perianth. Seeds lenticular, black, shiny, c. 1.25 mm. in diam., reticulate centrally with convex areolae, almost smooth marginally.
