Enlightenment experiment

Karl Popper bade us wake from Plato's spell
millennia long gone since it was cast
an exorcism with no book, nor bell
to liberate us from the hoary past
the Perfect need not always be behind
all striving forward need not be downslope
the Golden Age is only of the mind
despair's no more our lot in life than hope
perfectibility is in our hands
a reasonable People can decide
establishing the rule of law, not man
with only human reason as our guide
a bold, but not unreasonable thing
to set forth a new nation with no king