Prajwal N R - Talakadu

The River That Remembered Me

Photo by: Author

There are moments when reality itself feels like a cruel trick. Am I truly here? Is happiness just a fleeting illusion? Does one need faith in God to feel whole? What if science has deceived us? What if philosophy is nothing more than a carefully woven distraction, a labyrinth of words meant to keep us from staring too long into the abyss? Every time these thoughts creep into my mind, I try to dismiss them as overthinking. But they persist—whispering, circling, tightening their grip—until they feel less like thoughts and more like echoes from something beyond comprehension.

I would have ignored them, buried them beneath the mundane routines of life, if not for what happened in Talakadu—a cursed land, shrouded in history and silence.

I won’t bore you with the folklore; you can look that up yourself. What I will share, however, is what I felt—something that still lingers in my mind like an unfinished dream, something I struggle to explain even to myself.

Talakadu is a graveyard of time, half-swallowed by sand, its secrets buried beneath centuries of shifting earth. Some say the true grandeur of the Chola dynasty is yet to be unearthed, waiting beneath layers of dust and oblivion. But there is something else here, something far older than our belief systems. It breathes in the air, hums in the silence, and lingers in the spaces between logic and madness.

We had come seeking the five sacred lingas, ancient relics of worship. The journey was arduous—sand trekking through remnants of sanctuaries long forgotten. With each step, I felt a strange unrest, as if the air itself carried whispers of another time. At first, I chalked it up to the natural high of visiting a new place. But as we neared the Cauvery River, a feeling took hold of me—something I had no words for.

Photo by: Dr. Archan Mitra

Archan Mitra, my colleague, was eager for a coracle ride. The river, calm yet endless, stretched before us like a gateway to some unknowable realm. The boatman, a wiry man with knowing eyes, promised a long ride for a mere 200 rupees. We agreed, unaware that the price we were about to pay had nothing to do with money.

As the coracle drifted toward the center of the river, something shifted. The world around me blurred—not physically, but in a way I can only describe as a fracture in time itself.

I have always considered déjà vu a neurological hiccup, a trick of the brain. But this was different. This was not déjà vu. This was a memory of the past, a moment I had already lived before.

I sat there, paralyzed, as waves of recognition crashed over me. The sound of the river, the way the sunlight fractured on the water, the distant echo of temple bells—it was all exactly as I remembered it. And yet, it was happening for the first time.

Time unraveled.

For how long? I couldn’t say. Seconds? Minutes? An eternity?

I wanted to speak, to ask Mitra, if he felt it too—but I couldn’t. It was as if the river had swallowed my voice. And then, just as suddenly as it came, the feeling vanished.

I was back.

But something had changed.

Photo by: Dr. Archan Mitra

Even now, as I write this, I feel a cold certainty in my bones—that moment was not meant for me alone. It was a fragment of something larger, a glimpse into the fractures of reality itself.

People say the human mind forgets as a form of mercy. That time erodes memories for our own good. But science suggests otherwise. Nothing is truly forgotten. Every experience is locked away, waiting for the right key, the right trigger.

Perhaps science, one day, will solve the mysteries of the human subconscious, unlock the doors we are too afraid to open. Perhaps technology will finally answer the questions I am too terrified to ask.

But until then, I live with The Coracle Paradox—the knowledge that some things are remembered before they even happen.

And the suspicion that somewhere, in some other timeline, I am still sitting in that boat, drifting toward a truth I may never be ready to face.

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The River That Remembered Me

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