M2:1943 — پنبهٔ وسواس بیرون کن ز گوش / تا به گوشت آید از گردون خروش

This couplet is part of a series of commands urging the spiritual seeker to purify their inner faculties. Just as the previous verse invites the listener to hear a spiritual concert (samāʿ) from beyond the celestial sphere, this one specifies the prerequisite: removing the metaphorical "cotton" that blocks the ears.

This cotton is not physical; it is waswās, a term for obsessive, satanic, or distracting whispers and anxieties that fill the mind and prevent spiritual perception. The "cry from the firmament" (khorūsh-e gardūn) is likewise not a physical sound but a spiritual reality—the voices of angels, divine inspiration, or even revelation (waḥy) itself. Rumi's point is that if one can achieve a state of inner purity and silence, one becomes receptive to these higher realities.