Proverbs 5:16 New English Translation

¹⁶Should your springs be dispersed^[a] outside,
your streams of water in the wide plazas?^[b]

Proverbs 5:16 tn The verb means “to be scattered; to be dispersed”; here the imperfect takes a deliberative nuance in a rhetorical question.
Proverbs 5:16 tc The verse is usually understood as a rhetorical question, expecting a “no” answer (e.g. NIV, NASB, ESV, NKJV). The LXX records a negative volitional statement “Let them not flow out.”

New English Translation (NET)