Carpets and rugs are among the most prominent symbols in a remarkably large number of literary stories of flight—repeatedly becoming an ambiguous metonymy or a complex metaphor. But beyond the narrative or poetic imagery, further productive connections can be found between the theme of flight and the rug as an object of fleeing, for example when the carpet becomes the medium of the narration itself, or when its material nature serves to represent such stories. In this paper, we will explore four levels of narrated or narrating carpets by using examples from literature and art: Our comparative analysis starts with the form and function of carpets as a medium of flight as exemplified both by Sigmund Freud and Silvina Der-Meguerditchian and moves on to the carpet as a material artifact with reference to the Bayeux Tapestry. It ends with remarks on the carpet as an object of reflection on flight knowledge in works by Franz Werfel, Ilija Trojanow and Siegfried Lenz, as well as on its own poetological situation, with the carpet becoming a narrative device of aesthetic production.