Butterflies

The gold-barr'd butterflies to and fro
And over the waterside wander'd and wove
As heedless and idle as clouds that rove
And drift by the peaks of perpetual snow.

Butterflies are mainly day-flying insects of the order Lepidoptera, the butterflies and moths. Butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. Butterflies comprise the true butterflies (superfamily Papilionoidea), the skippers (superfamily Hesperioidea) and the moth-butterflies (superfamily Hedyloidea). All the many other families within the Lepidoptera are referred to as moths.

Some species are pests because in their larval stages they can damage domestic crops or trees; others, however, are agents of pollination of some plants, and caterpillars of a few butterflies (e.g., Harvesters) eat harmful insects. Culturally, butterflies are a popular motif in the visual and literary arts.

Sourced

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 88.

• I'd be a butterfly, born in a bower,
  Where roses and lilies and violets meet.
  • Thomas Haynes Bayly, I'd be a Butterfly.

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

• 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, Book of Songs, New Spring, No. 7.

• Far out at sea,—the sun was high,
  While veer'd the wind and flapped the sail,
  We saw a snow-white butterfly
  Dancing before the fitful gale,
  Far out at sea.
  • Richard Henry Horne, Genius.

• The gold-barr'd butterflies to and fro
  And over the waterside wander'd and wove
  As heedless and idle as clouds that rove
  And drift by the peaks of perpetual snow.
  • Joaquin Miller, Songs of the Sun-Lands, Isles of the Amazons, Part III, Stanza 41.

• And many an ante-natal tomb
  Where butterflies dream of the life to come.
  • Percy Bysshe Shelley, Sensitive Plant.

• Much converse do I find in thee,
  Historian of my infancy!
  Float near me; do not yet depart!
  Dead times revive in thee:
  Thou bring'st, gay creature as thou art!
  A solemn image to my heart.
  • William Wordsworth, To a Butterfly.