Parasitic shrub, sometimes to about 1 m long; branches flattened, 2-edged (especially the younger ones), the scurfy margins extending onto midrib of blades. Leaves glabrous; petioles 3-10 mm long; blades ovate-elliptic, obtuse to rounded at apex, rounded at base, 5-10 cm long, 3-5 cm wide, coriaceous, the veins often visible. Spikes 1 or 2 per axil, to 15 cm long; flowers bisexual, 4-6-parted, maroon, 1-2 mm long, in sessile ternations, these widely spaced along the furfuraceous, lenticellate spikes; calyculus truncate; tepals valvate, oblong, acute; stamens shorter than tepals; filaments thick, fused to lower half of tepal; anthers about as broad as long, held at the level of the style; ovary red; stigma sessile; nectary prominent, the nectar rather copious. Fruits oblong, ca 5 mm long, becoming yellow or orange at maturity, drying gray to brown; exocarp thin but leathery; mesocarp sticky, white; seed l. Croat 6812, 7919. Common in trees of the Laboratory Clearing; frequent elsewhere. Flowers and fruits throughout the year. The fruits are a favorite of small birds. Belize to Peru, Bolivia, and Brazil. In Panama known from tropical moist forest in the Canal Zone, Bocas del Toro, Colon, and Veraguas, from premontane moist forest in Panama, and from premontane wet forest in Chiriqui, Panama, and Darien.