The poem is a message

Everyone in Rotterdam knows them: the verses of poetry on the sides of the city’s cleaning and garbage-collection vehicles. The City Maintenance trucks have been doing more than removing household refuse and cleaning the Binnenrotte after the market. Ever since 1988 they have also brought exquisite poetry into Rotterdam homes. The verses on these trucks are taken from the poets who perform at the annual Poetry International Festival. This project, ‘Het gedicht is een bericht’ (The poem is a message), owes its name to the eponymous poem by Jules Deelder. It was one of the first verses to be inscribed on the trucks.