Joy Plants.

If you blink, you miss them. this was not the right plant for a pot on the porch. It got very tall and the leaves aren't particularly attractive. After much waiting and anticipation, it puts forth one drooping bud a day which slowly opens to stand upright and reveal quite a spectacular red and black bloom. You can see it here if you care to. The next day the flower is gone, red petals scattered to the wind and replaced by these curious seed capsules. 

When pierced, the seed capsules produce sticky white latex which leaks out of a cut  in the seed pod and dries. It is then carefully scraped off the seed pod and turned into opium. As early as 3,400B.C. the Sumerians called it the 'joy plant' due to its highly addictive properties. Opium had traveled along the Silk Road through Egypt, India and China from the Mediterranean by 1300 BC  

It has many derivatives  including morphine, codeine, oxycodone and heroin. 

With such a storied history, it is interesting to note that this plant with its
five pods wound up in a pot on our porch, and the blossoms for which we bought it lasted but a single day....I don't think I'll bother to harvest the seed capsules, but I'm sure curiosity will force me to pierce them and see what comes out....