Fourseventyfive a day nineteen months—

Four-seventy-five a day, nineteen months—

I finally did the sum

last Tuesday sitting in the merge lane,

and nine hundred dollars just sat there, dumb

and reasonable, the way a number does

when it's been accruing without your permission.

The transponder beeped. The arm went up.

I was through before I made the decision

to be through. The green light on the dash,

that small dependable blink I've never

acknowledged in four hundred mornings.

I don't remember any of them. Ever.

The arm comes down. I'm already past the ramp,

already somewhere the road becomes routine.

Nine hundred dollars. Four hundred beeps.

The gate behind me. The green.