Green’s Dictionary of Slang

orig. a kiss in which the lips only lightly touch the skin; modern use refers to fluttering one’s eyelashes against one’s partner’s skin to caress it; also as v.

1849		Godey’s Lady’s Book Oct. 229/1: The light butterfly kiss of ceremony.
1871		‘George Eliot’ Middlemarch I 73: Celia knelt down [...] and gave her a little butterfly kiss.
1894		Brewer Dict. Phrase and Fable 192/2: Butterfly Kiss (A) A kiss with one’s eyelashes, that is, stroking the cheek with one’s eyelashes.
1903		St Paul Globe (MN) 6 Dec. 6/5: Here’s to a butterfly kiss [...] A tender caress.
[1905		Bulletin (Sydney) 21 Sept. 40/2: But she kindly permitted Campbell to take her hand, and to brush her soft palm with eager ‘butterfly’ lips].
1916		Eve. Star (Wash., DC) 16 Apr. 40/2: Louise Searles swept the other’s cheek with a butterfly kiss before she answered.
1920		Beaver Herald (OK) 9 Dec. 7/5: She touched her mother’s white hair with a butterfly kiss.
1932		E. Waugh Black Mischief 58: ‘I’ve invented a new way of kissing. You do it with your eye-lashes.’ ‘I’ve known that for years. It’s called a butterfly kiss.’.
1945		G. Endore Methinks the Lady (1947) 47: Don’t you know what a butterfly kiss is? [...] You flutter your eyelashes against his cheek, and then he flutters his against yours.
1954		F.S. Caprio Female Homosexuality 236: She said she was going to give me a butterfly kiss.
1968		G. Swarthout Loveland 224: You claim to be a supersmoocher—well, Butterfly-kiss me.
1977		S. Kernochan Dry Hustle 178: Those are the eyelashes. [...] Spread your hand and I’ll give you a butterfly kiss.
1990		A. Vachss Blossom (1991) 182: I [...] felt her eyelashes flutter on my cheek. ‘That’s a butterfly kiss.’.
1997		Bugbios ‘Lepidopteral Symbology’ Nov. 🌐 The butterfly kiss represents a very sensual kiss performed with the eyelashes.