Plants with slender creeping rhizomes. Culms 20–35 cm tall, 2-noded. Leaf sheaths smooth, glabrous; leaf blades flat or involute, basal 2–5 cm, 2–3 mm wide, culm blades shorter and broader, both surfaces smooth and glabrous, margins scabrid; ligule 2–2.5 mm. Panicle loose or contracted, 2.5–5 × 1–3 cm, with ca. 10 spikelets; branches capillary, smooth, flexuous, pubescent. Spikelets obovate, 5–6 mm, purplish; glumes subequal, as long as spikelet, broadly ovate-oblong, 3-veined, apex hyaline, otherwise purple, back glabrous or a few scattered hairs; lower florets staminate, lemmas densely pubescent; first lemma bilobed, awnless; second lemma 2-cleft to about middle, short-awned from sinus, awn straight, 2–3 mm; bisexual floret ca. 2.5 mm, pubescent above middle; palea 2-veined; anthers 1.2–1.5 mm.