Butterfly Legends & Poems - Page 2

A Symbol of Hope

A Symbol of Hope
A butterfly lights beside us like a sunbeam
And for a brief moment its glory and beauty belong to our world
But then it flies again
And though we wish it could have stayed...
We feel lucky to have seen it.

Unknown

From an Easter service attended by
Penny Wilson of Monarch Meadows.

As you release this butterfly in honor of me,
know that I'm with you and will always be.

Hold a hand, say a prayer,
close your eyes and see me there.

Although you may feel a bit torn apart,
please know that I'll be forever in your heart.

Now fly away butterfly as high as you can go,
I'm right there with you more than you know.

By Jill Haley

Hi everyone,

just wanted to also share some butterfly poems that I found while surfing one night. Authors to these unknown. I get great response from releasees about these. So enjoy :~)

Wings:

You have given me wings with which to fly
Now I breathe in deep and spread them wide
as we lift off from the silken petals
into the wind where the butterflies glide.

While Waiting for Thee:

Don't weep at my grave, for I am not there,
I've a date with a butterfly to dance in the air.
I'll be singing in the sunshine, wild and free,
Playing tag with the wind, while I'm waiting for thee.

~~ We are as the wings of a butterfly, bound together with the love of God

Jenn, The Butterfly Box

Spring:

Today, we release a butterfly
as a symbol of new beginning and life.
We celebrate the resurrection
and rejoice in the wonder, and reconnection.
As it glides away in the warm Spring air,
and flutters among the blossom there,
and stops to rest on a flower or two,
and takes a drink of the morning dew,
we remember that there is nothing too small
that our faith in Christ should ever stall.

Autumn:

Today, we release a butterfly
as a symbol of new beginning and life.
We celebrate the resurrection
and rejoice in the wonder, and reconnection.
As it glides away on the Autumn breeze,
and flutters among the wind-blown leaves,
and stops to rest on a flower or two,
and takes a drink of the morning dew,
we remember that there is nothing too small
that our faith in Christ should ever stall.

Feel free to use © Jacqui Knight
Russell, Bay of Islands, New Zealand
www.bitbybit.co.nz
coming soon... www.madambutterfly.co.nz

A butterfly release for a funeral or memorial service is an appropriate, touching, and dignified way to honour the memory of your loved one. The release is peaceful, healing and serene, and an inspirational way of providing friends and family a special way to express final goodbyes.

Look through eyes of hope and see
a butterfly inside the caterpillar,
hope knows that beauty is waiting to be born
in the unlikeliest places…

Thea Miller Ryan

“Often in life what appears to be an ending
is really a glorious new beginning”.

A couple of weeks ago, we filled an order for a 22 year-old's funeral, and we received this poem from the funeral...

"A butterfly lights beside us like a sunbeam.
And for a brief moment its glory and beauty
belong to our world.
But then it flies on again,
and though we wish it could have stayed,
we feel so lucky to have seen it."
On the back of the paper it says:

"Today we celebrate life with the release of butterflies. The animals you have been given will emerge from their envelopes and alight on your hand for a moment before flying off. Butterflies, a symbol of life, and freedom, were always special to (name). When instructed, please open the envelope and allow the butterfly to emerge on its own. It may take a few moments for the beautiful creature to adjust to the light and temperature before it flies off. These animals are natives, will thrive and insure the continuation of their species, keeping memory alive."

Miss Me But Let Me Go..

When I come to the end of the road
And the sun has set for me,
I want no rites in a gloom-filled room.
Why cry for a soul so free?

Miss me a little but not too long,
And not with your head bowed low.
Remember the love that we once shared.
Miss me, but let me go.

For this is a journey we all must take
And each must go alone,
It’s all a part of the Master’s plan,
A step on the road to Home.

When you are lonely and sick of heart
Go to the friends we know,
And bury your sorrows in doing good deeds,
Miss me but let me go.

From Tillsonburg Hospital Auxiliary Newsletter

*Charlie Bradford, an Auxiliary member at Tillsonburg Hospital passed away and left this poem for his family and friends.

Messenger of God
Oh, Little Butterfly,
Messenger of God,
When I see you in the sky
I cannot help but nod.
You bring me respite
From grief and dispair
Everytime I see you
Sailing through the air.
You renew my faith
In all God’s wondrous plan,
And I know it’s all in FAITH,
Not in what I understand.

Kathryn Poland (4-12-01)

A Symbol of Hope

A Symbol of Hope
A butterfly lights beside us like a sunbeam
And for a brief moment its glory and beauty belong to our world
But then it flies again
And though we wish it could have stayed...
We feel lucky to have seen it.

Unknown

Butterfly Wings
Author: Robin Fogle

Like a butterfly emerges
And unfolds its graceful wings,
A child grows and develops
With the love a mother brings.
I'm thankful for the times
When you encouraged me to try,
For God gave me my wings,
But, Mom, you taught me how to fly.

Supplied by Diane Bachelder
Wings of Wonder - Guam

I AM NOT THERE

Do not stand by my grave and weep
For I am not there.
I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am diamonds that glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning hush
I am the swift uplifting rush of butterflies in joyous flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there.
I did not die.

Unknown

A butterfly flights beside us like a Sunbeam
And for a brief moment it’s glory and beauty
Belong to our world,
But then it flies on again;
And though we wish it could have stayed,
We feel so lucky to have seen it.

The butterfly counts not months,
But in moments, and has time enough.

Author Unknown

The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough. 
~Rabindranath Tagore



May the wings of the butterfly kiss the sun
And find your shoulder to light on,
To bring you luck, happiness and riches
Today, tomorrow and beyond.
~Irish Blessing


Butterflies are self propelled flowers.  ~R.H. Heinlein


If nothing ever changed, there'd be no butterflies.  ~Author Unknown


The caterpillar does all the work but the butterfly gets all the
publicity.  ~Attributed to George Carlin


What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a
butterfly.  ~Richard Bach


But these are flowers that fly and all but sing:
And now from having ridden out desire
They lie closed over in the wind and cling
Where wheels have freshly sliced the April mire.
~Robert Frost, "Blue-Butterfly Day"


I saw a poet chase a butterfly in a meadow.  He put his net on a bench
where a boy sat reading a book.  It's a misfortune that it is usually
the other way round.  ~Karl Kraus


The butterfly is a flying flower,
The flower a tethered butterfly.
~Ponce Denis Écouchard Lebrun


Beautiful and graceful, varied and enchanting, small but approachable,
butterflies lead you to the sunny side of life.  And everyone deserves a
little sunshine.  ~Jeffrey Glassberg


Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your
grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you. 
~Nathaniel Hawthorne


There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a
butterfly.  ~Richard Buckminster Fuller


They seemed to come suddenly upon happiness as if they had surprised a
butterfly in the winter woods.  ~Edith Wharton


With the rose the butterfly's deep in love,
A thousand times hovering round;
But round himself, all tender like gold,
The sun's sweet ray is hovering found.
~Heinrich Heine, "New Spring"


"Just living is not enough," said the butterfly, "one must have
sunshine, freedom and a little flower."  ~Hans Christian Andersen


Love is like a butterfly:  It goes where it pleases and it pleases
wherever it goes.  ~Author Unknown


I've watched you now a full half-hour;
Self-poised upon that yellow flower
And, little Butterfly!  Indeed
I know not if you sleep or feed.
How motionless! - not frozen seas
More motionless! and then
What joy awaits you, when the breeze
Hath found you out among the trees,
And calls you forth again!
~William Wordsworth, "To a Butterfly"


I only ask to be free.  The butterflies are free.  ~Charles Dickens


The butterfly's attractiveness derives not only from colors and
symmetry:  deeper motives contribute to it.  We would not think them so
beautiful if they did not fly, or if they flew straight and briskly like
bees, or if they stung, or above all if they did not enact the
perturbing mystery of metamorphosis: the latter assumes in our eyes the
value of a badly decoded message, a symbol, a sign.  ~Primo Levi


And what's a butterfly? At best,
He's but a caterpillar, at rest.
~John Grey


Flowers and butterflies drift in color, illuminating spring.  ~Author
Unknown


We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever. 
~Carl Sagan


This great purple butterfly,
In the prison of my hands,
Has a learning in his eye
Not a poor fool understands.
~William Butler Yeats, "Another Song of a Fool"


[N]ot quite birds, as they were not quite flowers, mysterious and
fascinating as are all indeterminate creatures.  ~Elizabeth Goudge


The butterfly, a cabbage-white,
(His honest idiocy of flight)
Will never now, it is too late,
Master the art of flying straight.
~Robert Graves, "Flying Crooked"


Know thyself!  A maxim as pernicious as it is ugly.  Whoever observes
himself arrests his own development.  A caterpillar who wanted to know
itself well would never become a butterfly.  ~Andre Gide


Do ye not comprehend that we are worms,
Born to bring forth the angelic butterfly
That flieth unto judgment without screen?
~Dante Alighieri


Bees sip honey from flowers and hum their thanks when they leave.
The gaudy butterfly is sure that the flowers owe thanks to him.
~Rabindranath Tagore, /Stray Birds/


We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes
it has gone through to achieve that beauty.  ~Maya Angelou


The fluttering of a butterfly's wings can effect climate changes on the
other side of the planet.  ~Paul Erlich


And the case of butterflies so rich it looks
As if all summer settled there and died.
~Philip Larkin, "Autumn"


Once I read a story about a butterfly in the subway, and today, I saw
one.  It got on at 42nd, and off at 59th, where, I assume it was going
to Bloomingdales to buy a hat that will turn out to be a mistake - as
almost all hats are.  ~Nikolaus Laszlo, Nora Ephron, and Delia Ephron,
/You've Got Mail/


A million butterflies rose up from South America,
All together, and flew in a gold storm toward Spain...
~Winfield Townley Scott, "Annual Legend"


In nature a repulsive caterpillar turns into a lovely butterfly.  But
with humans it is the other way around:  a lovely butterfly turns into a
repulsive caterpillar.  ~Anton Chekhov


Gray sail against the sky,
Gray butterfly!
Have you a dream for going.
Or are you the blind wind's blowing?
~Dana Burnet, "A Sail at Twilight"


The paired butterflies are already yellow with August
Over the grass in the West garden;
They hurt me.  I grow older.
~Li Po


This magnificent butterfly finds a little heap of dirt and sits still on
it; but man will never on his heap of mud keep still.  ~Joseph Conrad


Just like the butterfly, I too will awaken in my own time.  ~Deborah Chaskin


Women, don't get a tattoo.  That butterfly looks great on your breast
when you're twenty or thirty, but when you get to seventy, it stretches
into a condor.  ~Billy Elmer


Where have those flowers and butterflies all gone
That science may have staked the future on?
He seems to say the reason why so much
Should come to nothing must be fairly faced.
~Robert Frost, "Pod of the Milkweed"


As for butterflies, I can hardly conceive of one's attending upon you;
but to question the congruence of the complement is vain, if it exists. 
~Marianne Moore, "To a Steam Roller"


We must remain as close to the flowers, the grass, and the butterflies
as the child is who is not yet so much taller than they are.  We adults,
on the other hand, have outgrown them and have to lower ourselves to
stoop down to them.  It seems to me that the grass hates us when we
confess our love for it.  Whoever would partake of all good things must
understand how to be small at times.  ~Friedrich Nietzsche


The tulip and the butterfly
Appear in gayer coats than I:
Let me be dressed fine as I will,
Flies, worms, and flowers exceed me still.
~Isaac Watts


We are closer to the ants than to butterflies.  Very few people can
endure much leisure.  ~Gerald Brenan


Nerves and butterflies are fine - they're a physical sign that you're
mentally ready and eager.  You have to get the butterflies to fly in
formation, that's the trick.  ~Steve Bull


The least thing upset him on the links.  He missed short putts because
of the uproar of butterflies in the adjoining meadows.  ~P.G. Wodehouse


Grown-ups love figures.  When you tell them that you have made a new
friend, they never ask you any questions about essential matters.  They
never say to you, "What does his voice sound like?  What games does he
love best?  Does he collect butterflies?" Instead, they demand:  "How
old is he?  How many brothers has he?  How much does he weigh?  How much
money does his father make?"  Only from these figures do they think they
have learned anything about him.  ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, /The Little
Prince/, 1943, translated from French


It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by.  How
else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment?  For the
moment passes, it is forgotten; the mood is gone; life itself is gone. 
That is where the writer scores over his fellows:  he catches the
changes of his mind on the hop.  ~Vita Sackville-West


I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or
whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man.  ~Chuang Tzu