Annual creeping or trailind herb, upper parts sometime erect up to 30 cm.  Leaves opposite, ovale, up to five x 3 cm, 3-veined, from the base, sparsely hairy on both surfaces particularly on the vein when young. Margin serrate-crenate to almost entire. Capitula solitary, axillary and terminal on long peduncles, deep yellow.Ray florets usually present, 3-4 mm long. 3-toothed at the apex, yellow or rarely white.

The roots are chewed when thereare sores in the mouth, on the gums and in the throat. This leads to the numbing of pain for sometime and the patient can take food and drink without suffering. Sap from pounded leaves is applied to the tongues of children suffering from a certain disease which make the tongue sore. Crushed plants are applied to broken limbs, or mixed with water and the juice drunk for stomach-ache and diarrhea. The flower heads are commonly chewed for toothache and other mouth disease

The plant has been used  as a powerful aphrodiac in traditional medicinal practice for cases of sexual deficiency or depressed desire as it has been shown to improve sexual function in man, treatment of convulsion in children with malaria  fever