泼水难收 — Chinese idiom
泼水难收
pō shuǐ nán shōu
Traditional: 潑水難收
Meaning
- water once spilt cannot be retrieved ; irreversible change
Character by character
- 泼pōto pour, to splash, to sprinkle, to water
- 水shuǐwater, liquid, lotion, juice
- 难nánhard, difficult, arduous; unable
- 收shōuto collect, to gather, to harvest
Idioms sharing a character
- 瓢泼大雨 piáo pō dà yǔ
- 一清如水 yī qīng rú shuǐ
- 似水年华 sì shuǐ nián huá
- 出水芙蓉 chū shuǐ fú róng
- 如鱼得水 rú yú dé shuǐ
- 山明水秀 shān míng shuǐ xiù
- 山清水秀 shān qīng shuǐ xiù
- 山穷水尽 shān qióng shuǐ jìn
- 山长水远 shān cháng shuǐ yuǎn
- 山高水长 shān gāo shuǐ cháng
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.