In the "American Idol" of poetry recitation, you might say Oakmont High School senior Roshawnda Bettencourt is going to Hollywood.

Bettencourt, 17, took top honors March 14 at the state finals of Poetry Out Loud, a national contest that challenges students to memorize and perform poetry.

"For me, I've never won anything like this, so it's exciting and different," she said last week. "It's kind of surprising and it's all kind of sinking in."

Bettencourt, an Antelope resident, topped the Placer County contest Feb. 13 and beat out entrants from 19 other Calif-ornia counties who vied for the state prize. She'll now travel to Washington, D.C., for the national finals, to be held April 27-29.

The impressive fete came with Bettencourt's performances through three rounds of competition, which saw her recite two classic poems — "Sympathy," by Paul Laurence Dunbar; and "Time Does Not Bring Relief; You All Have Lied," by Edna St. Vincent Millay — and one modern entry: Toi Derricotte's "Passing."

Though Bettencourt's selections span nearly 100 years and reflect diverse genres, they have one thing in common: each one was personally felt. That resonance helps in presenting them to an audience, Bettencourt said.

"If you can have a personal meaning behind it, it's that much more powerful," she said. "I think about it personally because I can relate to basically all of my poems."

The contest, begun in 2006 as a partnership by the National Endowment for the Arts and The Poetry Foundation, seeks to promote literary arts among students by capitalizing on the hip-quotient of poetry performance and recitation, according to the Poetry Out Loud Web site. Think HBO's "Def Comedy Jam" meets English class.

That trend, though, may still be taking time to replace stodgy perceptions about the literary genre, Bettencourt said.

"That's what I don't understand," Bettencourt said. "I just don't think kids get intrigued in (poetry), but it's so much more than opening it and reading it. It's not meant to just be read."

Judges rate participants on physical presence, voice and articulation, dramatization, level of difficulty, understanding and accuracy.

And Bettencourt said each style calls for a different tactic: for free verse, don't get caught up in "just talking." But rhyming verse also has its pitfalls.

"You can't make it sing-song," she said.

As the California winner, Bettencourt received $200 in prize money, $500 in poetry books for her school, and a $100 gift certificate and luggage from Target. Things get even more interesting at the nationals, where $50,000 will be distributed among finalists.

Bettencourt, a drama student whose favorite poet is Maya Angelou, isn't quite sure where her talents will lead her — aside from Washington, D.C., that is.

"I don't really know what I want to do in life," she said. "I'm just going to keep it open and probably take some good lit classes when I go to college."