Tufted, densely hispid annual (rarely almost glabrous); culms 20-80 cm high, erect or ascending. Leaf-blades linear to narrowly lanceolate, 7-30 cm long, 5-14 mm wide, flat, sharply pointed. Panicle broadly ovate or broadly oblong, 15-50 cm long, the branches filiform, bearing spikelets on long capillary pedicels, the whole inflorescence eventually disarticulating. Spikelets elliptic or oblong, 1.8-2.5(3.3) mm long, glabrous, acute or acuminate; lower glume broadly ovate, membranous, a third to half the length of the spikelet, 3-nerved, obtuse, acute or slightly acuminate; upper glume 5-7-nerved; lower lemma 5-7-nerved, its palea about half as long; upper lemma pallid or yellowish to olive-brown, smooth and shining.