“...photographs of girl-children; some gaudy moth or butterfly, still alive, safely pinned to the wall.”

“Some girls are pretty, and it’s like they were destined for it. They were meant to be pretty, and as for the rest of us, well, we get to exist on the outer edges of life. It’s like moths. They’re the same as butterflies, aren’t they? They’re just gray. They can’t help being gray, they just are. But butterflies, they’re a million different colors, yellow and emerald and cerulean blue. They’re pretty. Who’d dare kill a butterfly? I don’t know of a single soul who’d lift a finger against a butterfly. But most anybody would swat at a moth like it was nothing, and all because it isn’t pretty. Doesn’t seem fair, not at all.”

“Bees and butterflies, moths and dragonflies, the flowers and the brooks and the clouds.”

“In our minds we tried to pin her to a corkboard like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew”

“People are like moths. First they are ugly and awkward, until they break out of their shell and become a beautiful butterfly.”

“Words betrayed her: beautiful butterflies in her mind; dead moths when she opened her mouth for their release into the world.”