“Aren’t we all one-day butterflies, not aware of time.
Searching for partners or honey, until death kisses us.
Then in his arms, tenderly rocked, waiting for a new chance
to fly away again and join the dance, of the one-day butterfly”

~Author Unknown 

“My little Mädchen found one day, A curious something in her play, That was not fruit, nor flower, nor seed;
It was not anything that grew, Or crept, or climbed, or swam, or flew; Had neither legs nor wings, indeed;
And yet she was not sure, she said, Whether it was alive or dead.

She brought it in her tiny hand
To see if I would understand, And wondered when I made reply, “You’ve found a baby butterfly.”
“A butterfly is not like this,” With doubtful look she answered me.

So then I told her what would be.

Some day within the chrysalis; How, slowly, in the dull brown thing,Now still as death, a spotted wing,
And then another, would unfold, Till from the empty shell would fly A pretty creature, by and by,
All radiant in blue and gold.

“And will it, truly?” questioned she – Her laughing lips and eager eyes, All in a sparkle of surprise
“And shall your little Mädchen see?” “She shall!” I said. How could I tell,

That ere the worm within its shell, Its gauzy, splendid wings had spread,
My little Mädchen would be dead?

To-day the butterfly has flown, – She was not here to see it fly, –

And sorrowing I wonder why, The empty shell is mine alone.
Perhaps the secret lies in this: I too had found a chrysalis,
And Death that robbed me of delight, Was but the radiant creature’s flight!”

By Mary Emily Bradley. Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

“On the wings of the tiniest earth angels,
may the spirit of those that we mourn today be remembered
and may this be the start of healing for all.”

~Author unknown

“A butterfly lights 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 although
we wish it could have stayed, we are so thankful to have seen it at all.”

~Author unknown