What can I compare you to?

So, I thought I'd share a little bit from my amazing 15 days in Italy. I wrote these exact words on a now tattered piece of journal paper that lays in front of me when I was in the Accademia viewing Michelangelo's David:

There is not a singular view of this sculpture that does not take my breath away. It is the strongest thing I have seen in my entire life. I could have never imagined he would be this colossal, because how does a man, an ordinary mortal man, sculpt something so monumental. Did he realize that no artist who came after him would be able to trump or ever come close to copying him? Did they realize his brilliance? The anatomy is SO correct even though he is sculpted unproportionally (as was Michelangelo's way with everything.) The natural shadows that are cast on him make him seem like he could breath. David has slayed a giant and here, he IS a giant. The lines are so organic... the way his limbs are so intricately sculpted out... his hair, his eyes, his buttocks, his VEINS, it's all exquisite. Is this where our ideal body images comes from? How could Michelangelo not have been in love with his newly animate creation when he was completed? How did he keep sculpting after this? Where else is there to go? I never fully understood the effects of contropossto until right now. He is standing there with no steel beam support. He is deep rich marble and genius. Nothing else. Marble and genius. How do we as artists define ourselves as anything of worth if he too is an "artist." How does something made of stone convey so much power? Ribs, fingernails, muscle contours, how did he get it SO right? Perfect? Yes, perfection in it's most pristine form.