Rather straggling annual or perennial herb up to c. 40 cm. tall, branching near the base, with the stems and leaves sparsely pilose, with branched hairs or with some hairs simple. Leaves 2–3 × 0·8–2·5 cm., pseudoverticillate, 4–6 in each false whorl, 2 often smaller than the rest, subsessile, oblanceolate to narrowly obovate, obtuse and mucronulate at the apex, cuneate at the base; stipules up to 7 mm. long, scarious, deltoid. Flowers in 3–9-flowered terminal or axillary cymes; pedicels up to 7 mm. long, sparsely pilose; bracts c. 2 mm. long, oblong, with hyaline, ciliolate margins. Sepals 9–13, green with hyaline margins, 1·7–6·0 × 1·0–2·3 mm., oblong-ovate, acute, 5–7-nerved, the outer ones gradually smaller. Petals 5–6, 2–4 × 1 mm., membranous, lanceolate to ovate, acute. Stamens 5–6; filaments 2–3 mm. long, broad and membranous; anthers c. 1 mm. long, broadly oblong. Ovary very broadly ovoid, shortly stipitate; style c. 3 mm. long, stigmatic arms twisted. Capsule c. 7 × 6 mm., broadly ovoid, smooth, brown, surrounded by the persistent sepals. Seeds reddish-brown, 0·7 × 0·5 mm., reniform; testa minutely reticulate.
