Two stems side by side, each with a pair of narrow leaves drooping from the joint. Squashed flat and placed on top of a character it becomes 竹 the radical, and it marks nearly everything once made of bamboo: 笔 (brush), 筷 (chopsticks), 笑 (laugh), 第 (ordinal number).
Bamboo is one of the Four Gentlemen of Chinese painting, alongside plum, orchid and chrysanthemum. It bends in the storm and does not break, and it is hollow inside — 虚心, empty-hearted, which is also the word for humble. Before paper, books were bamboo strips tied together, which is why so much of writing carries this radical.
Two BAMBOO stalks standing together, leaves hanging off each joint.
Because books were once bamboo strips, the bamboo radical still sits on top of 笔 (writing brush), 篇 (a piece of writing) and 简 (a bamboo slip, now 'simple').