syntax - Cannot insert string into MySQL text column

For some reason, my queries screw up when I write to a column of type "text". Here is an example:

Describe messages;
Field         Type          Null  Key  Default  Extra
id            int(11)       NO    PRI  NULL     auto_increment
title         varchar(255)  YES        NULL
body          text          YES        NULL
to            text          YES        NULL
content_type  varchar(255)  YES        NULL
is_sms        tinyint(1)    YES        NULL
user_id       int(11)       YES        NULL
created_at    datetime      YES        NULL
updated_at    datetime      YES        NULL

Then I try an insert:

INSERT INTO messages (id,title,body,to) VALUES ('1','Test Message','This is a test message. This is a test message. This is a test message. This is a test message.', 'an email' );

For some reason this causes a general MySQL syntax error. The query works fine if I remove the "to" column and it's corresponding value from the query.

Any ideas?