A headless line (known more pretentiously as "acephalous") is usually an iambic line that is missing its initial syllable, but which  retains the beats or accented syllables. (This is the opposite of anacrusis, which is the addition of a syllable at the start of a line.) Chaucer seems to have done this at times, of which this (from The Man of Law's Tale) is possibly an example:

                     >>>>>Yeres and dayes fleteth this creature
                                 Thurghout the See of Grece unto the Strayte
                                 Of Marrok, as it was hir aventure.

A better example is Blake's "London":

                             I wandered through each chartered street,
                               Near where the chartered Thames does flow,
                             And mark in every face I meet,
                   >>>>> Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

Notice that the last line has only seven syllables.

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