Renovating a house becomes a way of talking about the human urge to remake a life. The house itself suggests other versions of itself, “faces within a face.” The speaker and others want “other forms, more light,” yet the house resists: rooms refuse to add up, partitions have to be petitioned, shadows fall against their will. Even paint colors carry emotional weight—blue and yellow suggest different kinds of life, but they sit quiet and unmixed. The mood is wry, philosophical, and quietly disappointed. Plato’s ideal forms make the point that perfect two-by-fours exist only in an abstract heaven; here, real lumber rankles at plain geometry and gets nailed into imperfect human plans. The tone is not bitter, just tired. The final “still we sigh” captures the lingering frustration: no amount of modeling, molding, and remodeling ever quite produces the brighter, better version the speaker was chasing.
Remodeling — Summary
We were after other forms, more light. The house itself suggested other versions of itself, faces within a face.
Rooms refused to add up. We petitioned partitions. Shadows fell against their will.
Blue meant one kind of life, yellow quite another. Annuities of fate sat in paint cans, quiet, unmixed.
In Plato’s formal heaven, two-by-fours are Two By Four, grainless, ideal. Here lumber rankles at our plain
geometry, gets nailed to the crosses of our blueprints. We model, mold, remold, remodel. And still we sigh.