My daughter doesn't know what God is, an omission
I've encouraged by doing nothing about it.

Her great grandmother once gave her a lamb doll,
and when my daughter squeezes its hoof it leaks

"Jesus Loves Me," the lyrics to which my daughter thinks are:
Cheese is lovely this I know / with a big glass of merlot.

This isn't to say my daughter doesn't believe
in impossible things. She thinks

the lone fly droning around our kitchen
is the same fly from last month.

She's named it Bug-Bug; they're forever friends.  
My daughter knows all about forever:

forever is a car ride, chicken nuggets
spinning in the microwave,

the space between the final July 4th explosion
and Halloween’s first poked doorbell.

My daughter doesn't know what God is so she doesn't know
what evil is either, hasn't learned forgiveness

as barter, that fault can be swapped for grace.
My daughter forgives, then asks if we can watch YouTube.

I'm trying to teach my daughter grace
is everywhere, which is why I think she leaves

bowls out in the rain, to give the rain a place to live,
leaves the back door open in case the storm wants to come in.

My daughter doesn’t know what God is
so she hasn’t learned reverence.

At her great grandmother's wake
we put her down for a nap in an empty parlor,

me on the carpeted floor, her head in my lap,
the light blue as the dreams of snow. But she couldn't sleep.

She kept asking who the people were
gathered around us.

My daughter wanted to know why
they were all singing.