Hrothgar's is a vehicle through which poetics creates prefigurations; the most significant part of this passage is at the very end, where the poet writes "and death will come, / dear warrior, to overwhelm you" (1767-1768). It is not the inevitability of death that portends; it is the metaphor that death will sweep you away. Being swept away means going somewhere else, or getting caught up in something that takes you away from reality or makes you forget what's important. At the end of the poem Beowulf is overwhelmed by the statement that, because he has killed monsters before he can do so again, this pride in his past glory leads to his death, where he is swept away.