Imagery in "Daddy"

Sylvia Plath, in her confessional poem "Daddy", describes a metaphor that evokes dark images in the minds of the readers. This metaphor, one relating to the dark and gruesome times of the Nazis during WWII, ultimately conveys Plath’s understanding of her relationship with the men in her life, including her father and her husband.
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Plath, in order to depict her relationship with her father, prompts readers to call upon harsh and unsettling images from the reign of terror of the Nazi's. She writes, "I thought every German was you, / and the language obscene/ An engine an engine/ Chuffing me off like a Jew." The German that Plath is referring to in this line is her father, who is being compared to a Nazi. She compares herself to the Jew, and by doing this, attemps to portray the abuser/victim relationship that she felt she had with her father. (Even though this is confessional poetry, it is not necessarily autobiographical) The image that Plath depicts is of the massive termination systems that the Nazi's had in place in the concentration camps. A picture that I felt adequately portrays Plath's image is one of the crematoriums found in the Belsen-Bergen camp. This ghastly black-and-white image is deprived of any signs of happiness or emotion and for many Jews was the final stop of a physically and emotionally devastating journey. It is a symbol of death and despair, however it could also be argued as a symbol of hope. Compared to the torture of the concentration camps, death was peace, a soul at rest. Plath works this idea of hope into her metaphor with 57-60, "I was ten when they buried you. / At twenty I tried to die / And get back, back, back to you. / I thought even the bones would do." Here, Plath attempts to get "back to" her father (a common characteristic of an abuse victim is that they are psychologically drawn to their abuser), under the impression that death alone would be enough to solve her psychological problems. She however failed to kill herself however, evident in the next lines, "But they pulled me out of the sack, / And they stuck me together with glue."
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Another picture I felt depicts this metaphor is the one on the left, which shows a girl cowering under the extended hand of what is presumably a man. This girl, representing Plath in the age that her father was still alive, stands in for the Jews from the Nazi metaphor, while the man stands in for the Nazi.
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Plath is able to convey this metaphor primarily because of her use of language, and secondly her first person narration. Her tone is cruel and unforgiving, as she blames her father for her problems. Plath is brutally honest and does not hesitate to portray the worst of images. "The tongue stuck in my jaw. / It stuck in a barb wire snare. / Ich, ich, ich, ich." This type of imagery and onomatopoeia (ich, ich) contributes to the entire "Nazi : Jew :: Abuser : Victim" analogy. It sets the atmosphere and tone of the poem, and allows readers to sympathize with her. The fact that everything is in first-person, again, brings readers to a personal level and sets the readers against the father. There is no emotion reserved for the father, as there is none for the Nazis. Plath, through her language, is able to depict this image of her father as a Nazi, convincing the readers that her psychological problems are justified through the actions of her father.