Collaborative poem!

I haven't done a collaborative poem in a while, and since I'm on vacation it's a perfect time to give you long enough to chime in with your line!

Here's how it goes:

I'll kickstart the poem with one line (below). Go to the comments section of this post and submit ONE line to add to the poem. (If you submit more than one, I'll take the first one I see so that it's fair for everyone.) If people have left lines before you, make sure you submit a line that allows the poem to flow well. Feel free to use punctuation, and keep it relevant. At the end, I'll wrap up the piece with an ending line and post the poem in its entirety.

This time around, I'll take everyone's lines that are submitted before August 20 at 12:00 p.m. Pacific Time.

Here's the opening line.

My heart beats like smoke:

Write away!