 Solution

Extend the coefficient lists of each polynomial by zeros. Then $\rho (p,q)={\sum }_{k\ge 0}|a_k-b_k|$ is finite because only finitely many terms are nonzero. It is nonnegative and symmetric. Moreover, $\rho (p,q)=0$ holds exactly when every coefficient agrees, which by uniqueness of polynomial coefficients is equivalent to $p=q$.

If $r(t)=\sum c_k{t}^k$, the triangle inequality for the absolute value givesThus $\rho$ satisfies all the metric axioms. It is the metric induced by the polynomial coefficient sum norm.