The Butterfly. Is this the type, as poets paint, of man’s immortal doom, When into life and light he springs victorious from the tomb ? Alas, poor fly ! a fleeting hour is thine, thy struggles vain, And sinking soon, the child of dust returns to dust again. Of human weakness rather thou the type dost seem to me, Of thoughts that from the grovelling earth take wing and upwards flee, But, unsustained by heavenly power, yield to the passing storm, And from a wing’d and glorious thing descend a sordid worm. Father ! to thee for help I call, to aid my insect flight— Invite me heavenward by thy love, sustain me by thy might : But since the taint will still remain that waits on mortal birth, Hasten, oh Lord, and break the chain that binds me to the earth ! L. R.