def parse_phonemes(phonemes):
    """Parse mimic phoneme string into a list of phone, duration pairs.

    Arguments
        phonemes (bytes): phoneme output from mimic
    Returns:
        (list) list of phoneme duration pairs
    """
    phon_str = phonemes.decode()
    pairs = phon_str.split(' ')
    return [pair.split(':') for pair in pairs if ':' in pair]