Plants 4-70 cm. Leaves: blade elliptic, narrowly lanceolate, lance-ovate, or oblong, 14-120 × 4-32 mm. Inflorescences: floral bracts conspicuous, foliaceous, 7-37 × 2-12 mm. Flowers solitary or 2-flowered raceme, pink or rarely white or bluish, gaping, showy; sepals oblong, oblong-elliptic, or narrowly lanceolate, 14-23 × 3-7 mm; petals elliptic to lance-obovate, 13-25 × 3-11 mm; lip spatulate, 12-25 × 4-10 mm, margins involute, lacerate; crest often white, yellow, or green toward base. Capsules erect, ellipsoid, 14-30 × 4-8 mm. 2n = 18. Flowering spring--summer. Sphagnum bogs, poor fens, moist acidic sandy meadows and prairies, open wet woods, wet pine flatwoods, pine savannas, cypress swamps, sandy-peaty stream banks, seepage slopes, ditches, roadcuts, rarely calcareous fens; 0--1100 m; St. Pierre and Miquelon; Man., N.B., Nfld. and Labr. (Nfld.), N.S., Ont., P.E.I., Que.; Ala., Ark., Conn., Del., D.C., Fla., Ga., Ill., Ind., La., Maine, Md., Mass., Mich., Minn., Miss., Mo., N.H., N.J., N.Y., N.C., N. Dak., Ohio, Okla., Pa., R.I., S.C., Tenn, Tex., Vt., Va., W.Va., Wis.